Willing Prey by Allie Oleander
18+ Contains Adult Content
Willing Prey follows Claire and Shane. Claire who is recently divorced and drowning in student loan debt accepts an offer from Shane, who happens to be her ex-husband’s boss. Shane has offered Claire $30,000 all she has to do is move into his house for 30 days and be Shane’s prey letting him live out his primal desires by hunting her through the woods and having wild, kinky sex. There is a contract and rules, after all it wouldn’t do to fall in love with the man who hired you to be his prey would it?
It’s brutal.
Degrading.
Obscene.
Ifuckinglove it.
•Primal Play •He Falls First •Predator x Prey •Her Ex-Husbands Boss •Dark RomCom
•Primal Play including predator & prey games, hunting, scratching, hair pulling & biting •Rough Sex •CNC •Forced Orgasm •Light breath play/choking •Light Degradation by both MCs •Light restraint •Orgasm Denial by both MCs •Oral Sex •Semi public sex •Spanking •Transactional sex •Praise by both MCs •Age & appearance insecurities •Discussion of childhood emotional abuse •Discussion of hunting •Infidelity (not MCs) •Light alcohol consumption •Light Stalking •Physical violence •Prior death of a parent •Profanity •Sexual play with an inexperienced partner/no aftercare •Tick discovery & removal
“Spreading your legs for more, little deer?” His breath on the side of my neck makes me shudder. “You run and run, but secretly all you want is to be pinned, isn’t it?
This is my book club’s pick for April. I was asked to find some mild dark romance books for the group, so naturally I turned to Threads and TikTok. I ended up putting together a whole spreadsheet of recommendations for our book club leader, complete with tropes and formats (pat on the back for me). This is the one Summer chose. I’d never heard of this book or its author until it was recommended on Threads, so thank you to @heatherfrancesauthor for the suggestion.
Claire the FMC, has divorced her husband Keith after finding out he was cheating on her with a paralegal at his work. Keith is a lawyer whose boss is Shane Underwood. Claire had helped Keith pay off all his student loan debt on the knowledge that they would clear his and then work on clearing hers, this was obviously not the case and Claire was left owing around $30k in student loan debt.
Before they divorced, Claire & Keith decided to spice up their marriage by participating in a bit of primal play, Keith would chase and hunt Claire through the woods. Keith being the dick that he is, was telling everyone about this at his works Christmas party – he was already cheating on Claire at this point too the prick. Shane was disgusted with Keith but intrigued by Claire and promptly researched Primal Play.
Now all Shane had to do was sit back, wait for Claire to find out about Keith’s affair and then approach her…only Shane is not the best when it comes to expressing what he wants and instead of asking Claire on a date he proposes 30 days of Claire being his prey, where he will hunt her and fuck her with no strings attached and he will pay her $30k.
Shit.
Maybe that’s why the others got fired.
He’s so hot they forgot they were supposed to run
As far as the plot goes, is there some big, twisty storyline? No. You’re getting exactly what the blurb promises: she’s his prey to be hunted. Obviously there’s more to it on an emotional level and in terms of character growth, but that’s pretty much it for the plot… and of course, they fall in love.
Am I mad about it? Fuck no. This was everything I wanted. I’ve said it many times: I read for the good vibes, and this was full of good vibes. I laughed a lot while reading this book. Claire is funny and sarcastic, my type of girl.
I don’t often annotate or tab my books, but I’m trying to do it more. With this one, I tabbed all the parts that made me laugh, and this one quote really made me chuckle. It’s just such dry humour, and I love that.
“But I decided to sample what I’ll be hunting. It’ll make the chase more enjoyable.”
Sir, this is not a Costco.
And sampling wasn’t in the contract.
The humour is probably my favourite thing about this book, I laughed so many times…just little chuckles are Claires dry humour. I liked Claire, she was a well rounded character. I also liked Shane, there was definitely more to him than you first think. There is a vulnerability to him, that he keeps hidden under his dominating presence. He is caring, and doesn’t do things half arsed, although he didn’t realise how important aftercare was at first, but as soon as he did he apologised and made sure to do better.
I also liked that even though Claire was the prey, when Shane finally comes clean about wanting to be with her, she asks if she can be the hunter sometimes. Unlike Keith who thought it would make him less of a man to be hunted, Shane agreed and I liked seeing the roles reversed.
I liked that the side characters also stood out and I can’t wait for September to read Margot & Caine’s book. Keith like I said before is an arsehole and I really wanted Shane to kick his arse, but obviously Claire wouldn’t let him because she didn’t want Keith to sue him. Margot punched him, though which I was so happy about, she is a true girls girl.
I liked the pace of the book, and the setting of the woods. I also really enjoyed the writing style, it was easy to follow, flowed well and immersed me. I was hooked and couldn’t put the book down, I was on a TikTok live playing a quiz and every time it wasn’t my turn I was reading this book sneakily, haha. It made me laugh, it made me go awwww, cute!
“I want it,” I groan. “I love it. Love you running me down. Love you fucking me. Love it all. Please, Claire.”
“Good fucking boy”
Overall thoughts:
I really enjoyed reading this book, I was hooked from page one. I liked the characters, and even the side characters were memorable. I am looking forward to reading book 2. I recommend for someone who likes spicy books and wants to dip their toes in something a little darker. It is definitely mild on the darkness scale.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5
🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️/5
