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Review

4 All-round baddassery stars

I’ve been meaning to dive into this series for a while now, and I’m so excited I’ve finally made a start! Featuring strong, alpha heroes, strong, equally badass heroines, a bit of drama, a bit of humour, some suspense and heaps of action, this book had me hooked from start to finish and I loved it.

After a horrific upbringing, Abby was adopted by a neighbour when she was a teenager – a neighbour who just happened to be a badass military man and who taught her self-defence and set her on the path to becoming a highly skilled assassin. Now she’s all grown up, a ruthless killer who trusts no-one and only gets up close and personal if it’s for a job – using sex as a weapon and never letting anybody close. Abby has been deep undercover on a mission in Columbia, and it’s all just gone horribly wrong. She is supposed to be bringing down a dangerous arms dealer who runs a sexual slavery ring, but in order to save a group of young girls she blows her cover and ends up being taken captive.

And then along comes Jim Morgan and his team of badasses, who are brought in by Abby’s employer, Noelle, to go in and get her out. But her rescue is only the start of this story – ex-SEAL, Kane, is the man who pulls Abby out of her imprisonment, and he’s the one she begs to go back with her to save the girls who remain trapped. It’s a dangerous mission with little chance of everybody coming out of it alive, but reluctantly Kane agrees to help her, and the team soon rallies behind them and then it’s all happening!

And then, of course, there’s the romance. From the very beginning there is a spark between Abby and Kane. He is shameless in his smutty flirting, and though Abby may think she wants nothing to do with the sexy badass, her body has different ideas. But there are issues to overcome – they’ve both had difficult pasts and are wary of becoming involved, but Kane is willing to follow his heart (as well as other body parts) and is determined to get through Abby, and I loved watching him coax her into opening up to him.

“It makes you feel powerless, doesn’t it? You want me, you can’t fight it, and it makes you crazy.”
… “Maybe I just don’t treat sex as casually as you do.”
“Oh no, it’s all about control.” He dipped his head so that his breath tickled the bridge of her nose.
She didn’t know where he was going with this, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to. “Kane.”
“Control can be a very good thing to have, but sometimes you need to let go. Why don’t we try to see if you can let go, Abby?”
…
“I won’t hurt you,” he said quietly. “For once in your life, lower your guard and let yourself feel something, damn it.”

I really enjoyed Abby and Kane together. You can see the issues there, but you can also see them both desperate to build something together and the love story is a nice blend of emotional development and smokin’ hot sexy time. But can they deal with the possibility of a relationship after all that they have been through, and when factoring in the realities of their jobs? And how will their new-found closeness impact them in the field when they, and their friends, are facing danger and possible death?

I really enjoyed this book. Abby and Kane are great characters, their story is well told, and though there are some twists and turns along the way, I really liked the way it all played out. The storyline is fast moving, exciting and reads like an action movie, and the book is written in multiple POV, so we get a good introduction to some of the members of Morgan and Noelle’s teams, and the set-up is there for some fantastic books coming up! The dynamics between certain characters are established really well, and with the UST already simmering nicely, I can’t wait to see where the series is going to go!

I loved it – 4 stars.