Milo is an extremely wealthy young man, or he will be in another year when he inherits the money his parents left to him after they were killed. Until then, he's under the thumb of his sadistic uncle, who seems to delight in inflicting the maximum amount of mental and physical pain on the young man. There's no escape, since Milo's uncle pays for the care of his twin brother, who was also injured in the crash that killed his parents. If Milo flees, the uncle will stop paying for his brother's expensive medical care. Since Milo is also the subject of kidnapping attempts, his uncle hires a bodyguard. Although only a few years older than Milo, Tyr has a lot more experience of the world. He only recently left the army special forces for a job in private security. Although he knows there's something fishy about Milo's uncle, he is still expecting a routine assignment, until he meets the young man he's supposed to provide close security for.
This story harks back to some of the author's other rare stand-alone books, such as Testing Lysander. While there's still a strong D/s element, this is much more of an action thriller than the book series. It's a tense plot with several instances of abuse, most of which is off-page but related after the fact by Milo. You'll want to be aware of this before reading the story.
The narration switches between Milo and Tyr's points of view. It's easy to see why Tyr, or anyone, would fall hard for the young man. Despite living with all the things that wealth can buy, his treatment has kept him from acquiring all the negative qualities we associate with the rich and entitled. Yet, he's not as bitter as he could be as someone who has been the victim of prolonged abuse. As more than one other character comments, Milo is much stronger than he thinks he is.
Tyr is the very picture of the perfect dominant. He's strong and confident but not selfish. He and Milo have great chemistry. It's an interesting twist of the usual cliche of doms with a seemingly endless amount of time and money to spend on their submissives, who are usually either jobless or in service work.
“Hostage to Fortune” is available from or Amazon (commissionable link).
