Tough Enough
Series: Tall, Dark, and Dangerous #2
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Author: M. Leighton
Release Date: November 3, 2015
You seriously don’t want to miss MMA-champion-turned-Hollywood-superstar Rogan. Hotness!
From the author of the New York Times bestselling Bad Boys novels comes the second book in a dark, sexy contemporary trilogy.
He’s a fighter who never loses, but is he tough enough to win her heart?
There was a time when I had everything–a wonderful family, a bright future. Love. But all that was taken away in a single night, torn from me like flesh from bone. Since then, I’ve hidden away in my second-choice job as a makeup artist. But I prefer it that way, actually. I’m comfortable in the shadows, where no one can see my scars.
Kiefer Rogan literally took my breath away the moment I met him. MMA champion-turned-actor, notorious playboy, charming to a fault—he’s everything I vowed to avoid.
But he just wouldn’t stop until I opened up and let him in. Maybe I should’ve tried harder to resist him. Maybe I shouldn’t have fallen in love with him. Because I, of all people, know that everyone has secrets. Scars. And that they’re usually ugly and painful and destructive to the people we love most.
I just never guessed that they could be deadly, too.
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Get Strong Enough, the first book in the Tall, Dark, and Dangerous series
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Why me?”He doesn’t hesitate with his answer. “Something tells me you’re worth the effort.”
Well, this was certainly…different. If you’re expecting Tough Enough to be on the same intensity level as Strong Enough, don’t. This was a complete change of pace from the first book. It’s an emotional journey that’s both beautiful and touching. The suspense element is not the predominant factor here as it was in the predecessor. As a matter of fact, it was barely present up until the very end. Which actually brings me to my minor dilemma. I’ve been waffling with my rating on this book for days now. Do I rate it on it’s own, or do I rate it based on the series it’s in? But I’ll get to that in a bit.
In true M. Leighton fashion, Tough Enough grabs the reader’s attention with just the prologue.
Katie Rydale is a woman with secrets; deep, painful secrets that she’s still learning to live with. It’s been years since the even that changed her life irrevocably, and yet she’s still just a shell of the woman she used to be. A meek kitten that hides behind the shadow of who she used to be. She’s more comfortable behind the lime light as a makeup artist to the stars that bask in it.
Kiefer Rogan is the uber sexy MMA star turned actor and one fourth of the Delta 5 team that we were introduced to in the first book. Katie knows that men like him will only burn her. He’s just too everything; too sexy, too intense, too determined to get to know her.
If you’re looking for a swoony alpha hero, you’ll certainly get that with Keifer. His slow and determined seduction of Katie was one of my favorite parts about this book. I love a slow burn romance, especially one that’s layered in ripe sexual tension. As protective as Rogan is, he understands Katie’s limits and doesn’t push them. For all his intensity, it’s so refreshing to see a hero that’s respectful of a woman’s boundaries. He was just so incredibly sweet but without ever losing that edge that he has to him.
Katie is not exactly the kind of heroine I prefer to read about. She’s very demure and tends to withdraw into herself at the slightest altercation. I would have loved to see her come into her own a little sooner than she did.
If you’ve read the first book, which I highly recommend you do, then you know there was a particular suspense element that was left in a cliffhanger. Clearly there was a story arc that would continue throughout the series. I was expecting for this book to bring some of that intensity with it as well, but it never quite went there. The main focus was the relationship between Rogan and Katie while the suspense was more of an afterthought. I don’t have a problem with this, and up until the final 10% of the book, this was a solid 4.5 star read for me. This could easily be a case of built up expectations, but I found the ending to be rushed and well…anticlimactic. After all the buildup in book 1 for everything to be resolved the way it was, it just wasn’t as satisfying as I had hoped. I would have loved for that part to be really fleshed out and not just glossed over as it had been. But then again, I don’t know what the third book will bring, so it is tough to judge without having finished the series.
For all the minor issues I may have had, this book had my full attention from beginning to finish. So while I wished it had a bit more of an edge to it like the first one in the series, I still definitely enjoyed it.
New York Times and USA Today†bestselling author M. Leighton is a native of Ohio. She relocated to the warmer climates of the South, where she can be near the water all summer and miss the snow all winter. Possessed of an overactive imagination from early in her childhood, Michelle finally found an acceptable outlet for her fantastical visions: literary fiction.
Having written over a dozen novels, these days Michelle enjoys letting her mind wander to more romantic settings with sexy Southern guys, much like the one she married and the ones you’ll find in her latest books. When her thoughts aren’t roaming in that direction, she’ll be riding horses, swimming in ponds and experiencing life on a ranch, all without leaving the cozy comfort of her office.
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The sexual tension between these two is instant and so deliciously thick you can almost taste it. There’s nothing I love more than a good buildup and this book serves that up perfectly. Cari and Taryn know exactly what they’re doing and these two sure know how to tease and entice.
After that ending, I’m not sure whether to rock myself in a corner somewhere in my wait for the next installment or to hunt down Cari and Taryn and beat them until they give it to me. All I know, is I’m hooked and I want it. I need it. I have to have it.
I have a little secret…*whispers* I have an unhealthy addiction to legal dramas…comedies….romances…whatever. You name it, if legal procedures and trials are involved, odds are I’ve watched it or read it. So when I saw a new Legal Affairs book from Sawyer Bennett, it was a no brainer to read. This is only my third book by this author, and admittedly the other two I’ve read by her left me a bit underwhelmed. But having heard so many amazing things about her Legal Affairs series, I decided to bite the bullet and give it a go. And boy am I glad that I did, because Friction was absolutely fantastic!.
And so awkward, shy trailer trash Leary becomes sexy powerhouse Leary; using all her feminine wiles to win her cases. But she’s not just sexy and sassy, there’s a brain on her and that just made her that much more fun to read about. Now she’s handling the biggest case of her life; not so much in the form of money, but meaning. It means everything to her to win, and she needs to crush her opponent. Too bad her opponent is the sexy Reeve Holloway, a defense attorney working for the client that hers is suing…and determined to give as good as he gets.
It’s been a long while since I’ve read a book that touched me on such a visceral level. I don’t cry in books. Maybe I have a cold black heart, maybe I don’t have a soul, I dunno, it just doesn’t happen mkay. But here? I was a mess. A wreck. Absolutely and utterly pathetic. Sniveling, ugly crying, uncontrollably emotional wreck. In case you’re still not with me, basically I spent the first half of this book in this particular state:
My husband came home from work and caught me reading it, and after taking in my ugly crying state freaked out thinking someone died. True story. Basically, the moral of this story is do NOT read this book in public unless you want people to think there’s something seriously wrong with you. This book will tug at every heart string you have and rip it to smithereens. I’m not even kidding. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. I though it was just a fluke at first, so I went back to re-read a few key parts and nope! I was a wreck all over again.
That gif basically sums up my feelings for High and the rest of Chaos for the first half of this book. High is a royal asshole to Millie when he sees her again. She broke his heart all those years ago and he’s not about to let her forget it. She walked out on him and Chaos, and now that she seems to want the chance to explain, he’ll use the opportunity to switch the roles from twenty years ago.
I was afraid that I wouldn’t like Millie when I originally read the first chapter of this book as a preview in 
It’s not secret that I love all things Aly Martinez. The woman can do no wrong in my eyes. Between her emotional stories, captivating multi-dimensional characters, and incredible romances, I will never get enough of her books. But this one? This wonderful, beautiful, unforgettable book? She simply outdid herself with this one. It’s not often where I’ll read about a hero that’s neither a manwhore or an asshole, and fall completely head over heels in love. But that’s precisely what happened here. Sam Rivers may very well be one of my favorite heroes this year.
Now now, don’t judge me here! It’s fair to say that this had absolutely nothing to do with the book and absolutely everything to do with reader preference. I prefer my heroes alphas, and a more unassuming beta hero doesn’t tickle my fancy as much. While Sebastian is a great hero, he’s just not what I prefer in my books. If you’re looking for a story with a hero that’s as rich as he is nice, then Sebastian is definitely your guy.
A sexy, captivating and thrilling conclusion to a trilogy that captured me from the very start! If you haven’t met Hudson Chase, you haven’t lived. The man is intense, sinfully sexy, protective, with a touch of broody. While I’m not usually a reader of trilogies since my attention span seems to wane somewhere around book 2, I’ve been dying to get my hands on this book for one reason and one reason only: Hudson.
Nothing like floating on a life raft with your buddies after escaping a sinking ship and puking off the side to reflect on one’s life. But that’s exactly what Logan McCabe finds himself doing. When the discussion leads to the one thing they’d go back in time to change, there’s only one thing floating in Logan’s mind. The sizzling one night stand he shared with a woman eleven years ago that rocked his world. So what’s a man to do? Look her up, track her down, and proposition her for more, of course.
Logan is an ex-con with an aversion to cops, and the Abby eleven years later just happens to be a detective. A match made in heaven they are not. I absolutely loved these two together. Abby may be a touch prissy, but she sure gives as good as she gets. Logan is everything I’ve come to love in a Brazen hero, totally alpha and a dirty talking god. Add in a secret pregnancy trope, and watch the sparks fly! My only quibble is what I felt was a little too much cheese with the ending. 
Adorably quirky, laugh out loud funny, and deliciously sexy, Nuts was the perfect escape read I’ve had in quite a while. Alice Clayton just gets better and better with each new book, but she simply outdid herself with this one. If the Nuts is anything to go by, we have quite a bit to look forward to in Alice’s new Hudson Valley series.
Roxie Callahan is a celbrity chef in hollywood catering to the rich, famous and the entitled. She loves to cook…dealing with some of her clients? Not so much. So when an unfortunate butter incident costs her almost most of her clients, suddenly her kooky mother’s request for her to come back to the town she grew up in and run the restaurant while she’s away doesn’t sound so bad. Then a certain bearded farmer changes her outlook on the small town entirely…
In addition to the fantastic secondary characters, the wit and the humor, the setting of the book is what really hooked me. The author did such a fabulous job truly engrossing the reader in this wonderful town. I couldn’t help but be transported there myself as I was reading it.
