Book Review: Buttons & Pain

Title: Buttons & Pain
Author: Penelope Skye
Genre: Romance, Dark Romance, Fiction

What It’s About: Pearl makes it to New York, and enters the apartment she used to live in with Jacob, the douchebag that sold her to pay off his debts. He is surprised to see her, and pretends to worry over her, but Pearl tells him to shove it. Suddenly, a woman walks out of the bedroom the two of them share together–Jacob’s new girlfriend–and asks Pearl who the hell she is. Pearl tells her that she’s Jacob’s ex-girlfriend, who was sold by him to sex traffickers. At first the girlfriend, Danielle, doesn’t believe it, but when Jacob is incapable of denying it, she is disgusted with him and leaves the apartment. Pearl demands that Jacob give her the $100K that he made off of selling her by noon the following day and does not care how he does it, or else she will go to the police and report him. She takes back the keys to the apartment and then kicks him out for good. The next day, when he returns with the money, she goes to the police station and tells them that she’s not missing anymore. The detective takes her statement and asks her questions which she answers, choosing to leave Jacob out of it. The detective makes a comment that a friend of her was looking for her, which is why they did not stop searching for her and he was the one that found out the criminal organization in Tuscany that may have been the one that took her. It turns out that Jason had moved back to New York, recognized her on TV when Jacob made up the sob story about her being stolen, and didn’t stop searching for her. The detective calls up Jason, who shows up at the police station, and then takes her to his apartment on Park Avenue.

She stays for a while with Jason as she gets back on her feet, and ultimately gets a job with a different construction company since her prior job had already given her position away to a different individual and it wouldn’t be fair to let go of the other person so that she could have the job. She ultimately finds a job at a construction company and finds an apartment, that Jason helps her move into. Still, she needs sex, and it’s not enough for her to watch porn, so she enters a casual relationship with Jason.

In the meantime, Crow is unconsolable with the loss of Pearl though he knows he needs to let her go, and gets upset when he realizes that she may have other men now that she’s free in New York. He keeps an eye on her as the tracker had not yet given out, and watches her movements. At one point Lars, his butler, tells him that it’s sometimes worth living a short life with someone than a long life without them, and walks away from the kitchen.

After spending the weekend at Jason’s, Pearl returns home and finds some buttons on the coffee table–immediately knowing that Crow is in New York. The next day when she returns home, he’s waiting for her, and gets pissed at her that she was sleeping with another man. He threatens to kill Jason if she doesn’t go to the hotel with him, and work off her remaining buttons, so she agrees, but at the hotel, she refuses to go through with having sex with Crow out of principle–even though she wasn’t officially dating Jason, she still doesn’t think it’s right to cheat. When Pearl does come back to Jason and talk to him, he breaks up with her because he’s not comfortable with her requests for him to hit her, and cannot stop seeing her in the light of a victim. She tells him about Crow, and he thinks that she’s suffering from Stockholm Syndrome, but she tells him it’s not the case, and they agree to be friends.

Then Crow and Pearl spend time together with her trying to pay off the remainder of her buttons, but eventually, Cane calls him back and tells him that he has to come back to work. Crow tries to convince Pearl to come home with him, telling her that she’d be safe, and that Bones can come for her; but Pearl refuses his offer and tells him that she doesn’t wish to be afraid or to stop living because of Bones. Not only that, but she wants the one thing that Crow cannot give her–love. They spend the night together, and the next morning Crow leaves, giving her a business card, before heading to the hotel and the airport. Pearl is heartbroken, but she does venture out to do some shopping. On her way home, she spots a man that looks very familiar and remembers the guy that came to her apartment door looking for Jacob. She realizes that Bones’ men are in the city, and just before they tear down her door, she calls Crow to tell him that they’re here. They only get a brief moment to talk before she has to run and tries to fight them off, but the men capture her, put a sac over her head, and put her on a plane, where Pearl wakes up and pretends that she’s not awake so she won’t be harassed by the men.

Crow was on his private flight when Pearl called him, and he had to listen to her fight and get caught, feeling powerless about doing anything to save her. In frustration, he calls Cane who convinces him not to turn the flight around, and instead tells him that they’ll intercept Bones’ men in Rome. He then stays on the line with Crow for the remainder of the flight.

Once in Rome, Pearl is made to get into a car, but the guards make one fatal mistake–letting their guard down while in the car. She steals a gun from one, kicks him out of the car, but is not able to fend off the second guy who came from the passenger seat of the car to grapple with her in the back of the car, while the driver drives. Suddenly, there’s a crash, and Pearl gets thrown to one side of the car, only cushioned by the man’s body. Next thing she knows, Cane is opening up the car door and pulling her out to safety. He makes sure to hide her behind some crates that will give them protection from what is about to occur. Pearl watches as Crow stands in the middle of the clearing with the car lights on him, and a gunfight ensues, where Crow and his men come up on top. The remainder of Bones’ men are rounded up and made to kneel in front of Crow, who methodically goes down the row slashing their throat open so they can have a painful death. When he reaches the last one, he asks the man to call Bones, promising to spare him. The man called Bones, who immediately asks where they are and how long it will take them to get to his compound with the girl. Crow tells him to stay away; that he will not have Pearl. He then throws the phone away, stomps it, and shoots the man point blank. The police come in, but quickly realize it’s Crow and go the other way–they don’t mess with the Barsettis. At that point, Cane asks Pearl if she believes that Crow still doesn’t love her, after all he’s done for her. Crow comes up to her to check on her, and they return to his estate at the vineyard.

Pearl heals, and they continue spending time while trying to figure out what to do about Bones, with Pearl asking that she be the one that kills him. At one point during the night, Pearl finds Crow sitting in his office unable to sleep, and he admits to her that it’s the anniversary of Vanessa’s death, his sister. He seems to reject Pearl’s remaining touches of comfort, and she goes to leave, when he tells her that he loves her. At first, she doesn’t believe what he said, but he confirms it. Not too long after, Cane comes by the house to meet with Crow for business reasons, and Pearl confides in Cane that Crow is not marriage material, and that he won’t propose. The next day, she wakes up to a ring with a button on top of it, and a note that says Marry Me–she runs out to Crow in the vineyard, and agrees to marry him. Shortly thereafter, the two of them get married in the vineyard by an Italian priest, Lars and Cane. Pearl specifically made his wedding band with buttons encrusted in the metal, with help from Lars, and Crow loves the band.

The two of them go to Mykonos on a two week honeymoon, and spend some time there, after which Pearl is hesitant to return home. When they do, however, Crow gets a phone call from Bones who tells him that he has Cane and has tortured Cane for two week straight, but Cane never caved or gave up Crow’s whereabouts. Bones tells him that he will only exchange Cane for Pearl, and Crow tells him to kill him then, because Pearl is not getting anywhere near Bones.

Crow spends days searching for Cane and Bones, interrogating people who have seen Cane, but no one truly knows where he is. He had been calm and indifferent on the call with Bones, and to keep up airs in front of Pearl, but Crow is terrified about losing his last living family member, even though his brother annoys him most days. Pearl tries to talk to Crow, but he’s not having any of it; not willing to discuss or include her in the conversation, and he certainly is not willing to let her give herself up for Cane. He decides to take a nap, and continue searching–but the alarm he sets never goes off and when he does wake up, he realizes it’s night time. He also finds Pearl’s engagement ring with a note that she went to turn herself in exchange for Cane. Crow is furious.

Pearl drives through to Rome, where she meets with Bones. She waits for him to release Cane, and for Cane to come into the car before she gets out. She tells Cane to get in the driver’s seat and drive away, and watches him do just that, before going to Bones, who throws a bag over her head so she doesn’t know where they are going before taking her to his bunker. Cane drives straight to his brother’s estate, and Crow is immensely furious because he cannot believe he’s about to lose Pearl, so he interrogates his brother, who tells him that he was underground, within 30 miles of a church, and that Bones’ men were German or Russian. Crow figures out that it’s likely German, makes some calls, and finds out that there is one last remaining German made bunker in Italy that was purchased by an anonymous person, which he thinks is Bones. He, Cane and their men get ready to head out.

In the bunker, Bones approaches Pearl to have his way with her, and at first she panics when he’s on top of her, but when he turns her around, he realizes that she has a new stitching, so he asks her about it. Instead, she punches through the stitching, causing massive bleeding and pulls out a knife which she uses to stab Bones through the heart, and then through the eye while he’s in shock. She then opens the door to her room quietly, steals the guard’s gun, shoots both of the guards at her door, and makes a split second decision on which way to go to get out. As she’s making her way through the hallways, she comes upon a figure–Crow–who is just as shocked to see her, and she tells him that Bones is dead. He gets her out of the bunker and she sees Cane, who is more than happy to see his sister-in-law, but is the first one to notices that she’s bleeding profusely. Crow opens up the shirt and finds her injury, so he rushes her a doctor.

When she wakes up, she tells Crow that she created the stitches herself to carry the knife (though she protects Lars by lying), and Cane is immensely grateful to her for saving his life, so they become pretty close, though Crow is not happy with that due to what Cane had done to her previously.

My Thoughts: I really love the story between Crow and Pearl, though I’m really glad to finally see Crow break down and tell her the truth of his feelings for her. I’m so happy to see that he’s able to let go of those walls and be vulnerable with Pearl, who is seriously his other half. They’re perfect for each other, but I think the story was a bit of a stretch when Pearl managed to carry a knife inside a stitching on her skin. Not only does that sound incredibly unsanitary and potentially opening her up to diseases/illnesses, but it also is dangerous–a knife hanging out in the body would do a lot of harm.

Still, I can’t wait to read the next book in the series, and this time we will get to see things from Cane’s perspective, as he finds love (I hope?!)