VILLAIN
Series: Hero #1.5
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Author: Samantha Young
Release Date: December 5, 2017
The sexy and emotional companion novella to the New York Times bestselling romance HERO.
Nadia Ray is not just a broadcast meteorologist. She’s Boston’s morning television It Girl. Successful and independent, she’s put a past she’s ashamed of behind her and is forging a future she can be proud of. However, when her new boss discovers her secret he blackmails her, intent on using Nadia’s popularity to make them the number one morning show in Massachusetts. He wants her to be part of uncovering the city’s biggest scandal – a secret billionaire Caine Carraway is hiding.
Soon Nadia is thrown into the path of Caine’s best friend: sexy, wealthy bachelor Henry Lexington. But she doesn’t encounter the dashing high society gentleman Henry is purported to be. Instead she’s faced with an insulting and defensive villain who misjudges her at every turn.
When Henry finally realizes the truth, and decides to make amends, Nadia wants nothing to do with him. But she underestimates his determination and charm and soon they find themselves embroiled in an intense, passionate affair.
An affair Nadia knows must come to an end before their feelings grow any deeper and he discovers her secrets.
After all, Henry Lexington isn’t the only one who played the part of a villain once…
Henry got in next to me and threw me the kind of excited grin a child might at Christmas. “Ready?”“This is quite the car.”
“The words say impressed; your tone does not.” He observed as he pulled on his seatbelt. “Is it the top? Do you want it up so it doesn’t mess your hair?”
“I don’t care about that.” I frowned, annoyed that he’d think I’d be that concerned with my appearance. “I care about how weird this is.”
As we pulled into traffic, Henry slipped on a pair of aviator sunglasses. “What’s weird about two adults having lunch together?”
“Because forty-eight hours ago, we were enemies.”
“So melodramatic. We were merely mistaken about one another.”
“You were mistaken about me. I think I have you pegged accurately.”
“And that’s why we’re going to lunch because you don’t.” He shot me that sexy smirk. “You don’t know the good stuff.”
“Has anyone ever said no to you in your life?”
“Yes, frequently.”
“Have you ever listened to them?”
Henry chuckled. “Rarely.”
His laughter and the sight of him driving this beautiful car with lazy confidence, his strong hands lightly resting on the wheel, those ridiculously hot sunglasses—it all affected me. Greatly. A sensuous ripple fluttered in my lower belly.
Dear God, I really wanted him.
The realization caused my breath to escape from me in a shudder, drawing his attention. Quite abruptly, I made a decision. “I’m just going to put it out there in case you’re planning to take me to a stupidly overpriced restaurant for lunch.”
“Okay.” He drew out the word, sounding amused and wary at the same time.
“I don’t particularly like you. In fact, you have become one of the villains in my story so far. I don’t want to date you and I doubt very much that you are interested in dating me. However, I also doubt that you feel so guilty about your treatment of me that you merely want to turn around my opinion of you. No, sir. I’m here because you’re attracted to me. That’s okay because apparently, I’m attracted to you too. You’re hot and it’s obnoxious but I can’t deny it.”
Henry’s mouth twitched like he was trying to suppress a smile. “Okay.”
“We’re attracted to each other or you wouldn’t have asked me out and I wouldn’t have let myself be manipulated into saying yes. But let’s not pretend this is something that it’s not with chivalry and a date. You want to fuck me. And I’m amenable to the idea. So let’s cut all the bullshit and just do it.”
“Jesus.” Henry almost ran into the back of a car that had stopped at the light, slamming hard on his brakes. He looked at me and even though I couldn’t see his eyes, I knew his expression was incredulous. “You’re amenable to the idea of me fucking you? Did I hear that right?”
I flushed. “I’m sure you’re used to women with gentler manners but I’m a straight talker. I don’t believe in flowering up a situation so as not to offend delicate sensibilities.”
The traffic moved forward and Henry didn’t speak.
In fact, he stayed silent for a while.
So long that I began to feel my cheeks burn with humiliation.
I’d read him wrong. He really did only want to make amends.
I wasn’t his type.
Oh God.
This month had been really, really bad for me.
Finally, he pulled up outside a pizzeria on Tremont Street. Once he killed the engine he took off his sunglasses and turned toward me. His expression was surprisingly sober as he intently studied my face, as if he hoped to find answers there. “You’re right,” he said, his voice low, deep, “I want you. But I don’t consider anticipation bullshit. We’re going to have lunch. And you’re going to agree to have lunch with me on Thursday. And then you’re going to agree to be my date to the Delaney Charity Ball this Saturday. After which we’ll go back to your apartment and I will happily fuck you into satisfied exhaustion.”
For a moment, I couldn’t speak because his last sentence turned me on, his words alone sparking delicious excitement deep in my belly.
What the hell would the rest of him do to me?
Of course, after a second or so of physical arousal, the rest of his words sunk in. “What?” I shook my head in confusion. “No. We don’t need to have lunch or go to a ball together.”
“No lunch dates, no date to the ball, no penis for you. And you don’t want miss out on my penis. It’s a good one.”
I acted like my story deserved a hero. But only a heroine deserves a hero. And I wasn’t a heroine.
I couldn’t be.
The truth was in someone else’s story …
I was a villain.
Now it’s been a hot minute since I read Hero, but it took me no time at all to dive right back into this world. As the fun-loving, easy going, and quick with a smile best friend and business partner to the growly and grumpy Caine, I wasn’t sure how Henry would follow. I live for the enemies to lovers trope, and it was hard to imagine someone that smiley pulling off the a-hole vibe. But I shouldn’t have worried, because Samantha Young really gave me the best of both worlds with him; the a-hole at first and then the endearing. I absolutely adored the man.
“No lunch dates, no date to the ball, no penis for you. And you don’t want miss out on my penis. It’s a good one.”
Nadia is not a stranger to unwanted male attention. As Boston’s morning television It Girl and broadcast meteorologist, it wasn’t her smarts that got the viewership. She’s tried to make peace with the fact that her curvy figure will always make men undermine and misjudge her. Or perhaps its just her recent history with them. So when an assignment from her smarmy boss lands her in the cross hairs of a very pissed off Henry Lexington, she doesn’t back down from putting him in his place. What she doesn’t anticipate is Henry’s interest as soon as he realizes his colossal screw up with her.
I loved the way that Henry pursued Nadia and wouldn’t take no for an answer. She was determined to keep him in the sex only box and he was having none of it. Nadia was such an incredibly endearing heroine as well. For all that she’s been through, this is a chick with balls of steel and a spine that’s even stronger. She’s not about to back down or bow down to anyone, and I respected that so much in her.
Villain was this perfect combination of a delicious slow burn, with a splash of enemies to lovers, all wrapped up in a story that kept me glued to the pages until the end. It was entertaining, quick paced, and entirely satisfying. I absolutely loved these two together.
There was a bit of drama that was thrown in at the end, but it wrapped things up quite nicely. If you’re looking for a sexy, short, but totally satisfying novella, Villain will do the trick quite nicely. The perfect read to spend the afternoon with.
Samantha Young is the New York Times, USA Today and Wall Street Journal bestselling author of adult contemporary romances, including the On Dublin Street series and Hero, as well as the New Adult duology Into the Deep and Out of the Shallows. Every Little Thing, the second book in her new Hart’s Boardwalk series, will be published by Berkley in March 2017. Before turning to contemporary fiction, she wrote several young adult paranormal and fantasy series, including the amazon bestselling Tale of Lunarmorte trilogy. Samantha’s debut YA contemporary novel The Impossible Vastness of Us was published by Harlequin TEEN in ebook & hardback June 2017. Play On is an adult contemporary romance and the first in a brand new series set in Scotland. Villain is a companion novella to the New York Times bestselling romance HERO.
Samantha has been nominated for the Goodreads Choice Award 2012 for Best Author and Best Romance for On Dublin Street, Best Romance 2014 for Before Jamaica Lane, and Best Romance 2015 for Hero. On Dublin Street, a #1 bestseller in Germany, was the Bronze Award Winner in the LeserPreis German Readers Choice Awards for Best Romance 2013, Before Jamaica Lane the Gold Medal Winner for the LeserPreis German Readers Choice Awards for Best Romance 2014 and Echoes of Scotland Street the Bronze Medal Winner for the LeserPreis German Readers Choice Awards for Best Romance 2015.
Samantha is currently published in 30 countries and is a #1 international bestselling author.
Speak Your Mind