When I’m in Your Arms

Andrea and Chris Curtin once had a happy marriage. Over the years, however, things have gradually fallen apart. They no longer sleep together, and Andrea has thrown herself into her work, pushing herself to a heart attack (a mild one, as she keeps insisting) on her drive home one day. Chris is understandably concerned about his wife’s well-being, and he proposes an unconventional plan: that she hire a male escort. After some reluctance at first, Andrea begins exploring the world of hiring men for sex. A young man named Lucio catches her eye, and they are soon drawn together by more than mere physicality. Their attraction will draw them down a twisted path, and the Curtins’s marriage may be in more danger than before.

If you pick up this book, you’d better be ready for an intense ride. The sex, of course, is phenomenal. (I wouldn’t give it such a rating if it weren’t.) Andrea and Lucio are both in touch with the pleasures of female sexuality and sensuality, and it was a thrill to read a book so focused on a woman’s pleasure. Andrea’s emotions are rich and believable, and it’s delightfully easy to get caught up in her mind and her life. Andrea’s struggles are realistic and compelling, and Lucio’s backstory is heartbreaking and fascinating.

But it isn’t just about the sex, though I wouldn’t have minded if it were. Andrea and Lucio met once, years before the main plot of the book begins, though Andrea barely remembers him. Maybe it’s fate that brought them back together. Maybe it’s nothing more than chance. Whichever the case, the two of them are pulled together again and again. Even though hiring an escort was meant to ease Andrea’s tension and restore her relationship to her husband to normal, matters with Lucio rapidly go farther than she had expected.

When I’m in Your Arms is a steamy, thrilling page-turner that had me hooked from page one. I expected to enjoy myself while reading it; I didn’t expect to be completely swept up into Andrea’s life. From tragedy to joy and everywhere in between, this is a gripping tale of a woman’s attempt to navigate the labyrinth that is the human heart. In some ways, we have it easier than earlier women – I rather doubt anyone in 1918 could have gotten away with hiring a male escort – but this new ease only brings new complications, and Kelly does a masterful job in bringing them to light and bringing her characters to life.