By My Side by Michele Zurlo
Series: Safe Word: Oasis #2
Publisher: Loose Id
Genre: Contemporary, Erotic Romance, BDSM
Length: 80 pages
Summary:
Marcella Abbot has worked for Sean Winquist for more than a year. As his personal assistant, she manages nearly every aspect of his life. He’s a dom and she’s a submissive. Through their year working together, they’ve become friends and colleagues, but Marcella yearns for more. She’s in love with Sean, and she’s frustrated that he can’t see past her efficient exterior.
When Sean’s submissive for a BDSM benefit show cancels unexpectedly two days before the event, Marcella jumps at the chance to take her place. Sean wants Marcella, but he’s afraid to let the walls of professionalism come tumbling down and risk losing her.
Lea’s Review:
Michele Zurlo’s By My Side is an absolute joy to read. Interesting plot, great characters, emotional tension, BDSM play and an HEA ending are all within these pages in perfect balance. I literally could not set this book down and read the 80 pages in one sitting.
Sean Winquist is a philanthropist and Dominant. Marcella Abbot is his amazingly efficient, almost to the point of being a mind-reader, personal assistant. They have been working for several months to line up a terrific benefit that involves an elaborate BDSM presentation. When the woman who has been practicing to be the submissive for the benefit changes her mind at the last minute, Marcella offers to take her place. But while Marcella is a sub, she has never been in a BDSM scene with Sean.
The way Michele Zurlo develops the relationship between the main characters of this story is fresh and interesting. Sean and Marcella have deep feelings for one another, but even though these two quite capable adults have been lusting for one another for over a year, neither has voiced nor acted on their feelings. Right at the beginning of the story, the frustration expressed through gritted teeth, careful speech, little fantasies and body language show the reader that the undercurrents of the situation are right on the verge of erupting and gives fair warning that this is going to be an emotionally bumpy ride for the main characters.
The tension that runs through By My Side is both emotional and physical. The emotional strain is brought on by the supreme effort each person makes to do everything exactly right for the other. The physical strain is deeply rooted in sexual tension as well as their Dominant and submissive roles as they attempt to practice scenes for the benefit. BDSM scenes are not always about sex, but these two characters have been holding back their emotions for so long that the sexual energy is bubbling away just below the surface. And that means when the bottom falls out and each believes everything is over, the sadness and frustration is even more visceral, more painful.
I admire and appreciate the way BDSM is presented by Michele Zurlo. As opposed to what is written in most stories that have an element of BDSM, in real life every Dominant and every submissive have things they like and don’t like, and things they really want to like but their bodies just don’t respond to for some unknown reason. In this story Marcella has had limited experiences and knows some things she really likes and is absolutely determined to overcome the thing she specifically does not like. The author handles the build-up and resolution of that situation beautifully for both the Dom and sub.
The sex scenes in By My Side are smoking hot and I think the key to that has to do with the way the story is laid out. By the time the sex scenes take place, they are more than sexual happenings; they are occasions of making mad, passionate love after having yearned for a connection for so long. And while I haven’t mentioned him previously, there is a certain friend who helps Sean and Marcella see things more clearly. I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see him in the next book of the series.
As you can certainly tell by now, I loved this story and it is one I will return to again and again for an emotional boost and a smile.
Rated 5 Ravens and a Recommended Read by Lea!
