Just One Night, Part 1: The Stranger
“[a] fast-paced novella . . . [with] a real story . . .”
The Stranger, the erotic first novella in the Just One Night trilogy by bestselling author Kyra Davis might be dismissed as a copycat of the bestselling 50 Shades of Grey, but this novel gives some depth, respect, and sexual tension to the genre.
Kasie Fitzgerald is in a stable relationship with an old monied, responsible man named Dave. She's also a Harvard graduate who's carefully working her way up in the business world and not easily seduced by helicopters or whips.
Kasie is smart, but she makes bad decisions, doubts herself, and seeks safety in the things she should walk away from, someone the reader can easily identify as not so great. When she meets Robert Dade he unleashes the passion and fire Kasie has been suppressing her entire life. This sets her down the rocky path of self discovery as she wages an epic battle within herself.
She's faced with the choice of either holding onto a life philosophy she was raised on—beliefs that while incredibly stifling have nursed and comforted her through some very difficult times—or turning her entire world upside down in the hopes that there's something better, something that might allow her be who she really is without screwing everything up.
Not a decision anyone can make overnight. No one just walks away from a lifetime of habits and behavior without having a little freak-out, which is particularly true for Kasie since the vast majority of the people who are supposed to love her most want her to stick with the safer, more stifling route.
Right from the get-go when Kasie finds herself in Las Vegas slipping into her best friend’s tight designer dress you know the frock will soon be stripped off by some hunk with a fat wallet.
“What am I doing here?
“My name’s Kasie,” I say. My voice comes out raspy and flustered.
“Do you want to know my name?” he asks. “My full name?”
I realize immediately that I don’t. I don’t want to know who he
is. I don’t even want to know who I was yesterday or who I will be
tomorrow. I just want to know who I am now.
“I don’t do this,” I whisper. But even as I say it I know that I’m
talking about yesterday, tomorrow. Tonight is . . . different.”
Luckily this sexy, hot billionaire doesn’t seem to be too screwed up. But he does like to screw. While Kasie wants to do the right thing and remain faithful to her fiancé, she’s not sure if by doing so she is being faithful to herself. Once she succumbs to Mr. Dade—again and again—sexual tension seems to radiate from everyone she meets, except from her soon-to-be-husband.
Intrigue, business deals, office politics and passionate sex are seductively placed throughout this fast-paced novella, but a real story is being plotted out in this first of three books. When the last page is turned a surprisingly dark twist awaits both Kasie and readers alike.
Yes, yes, yes!