KISSED
Standalone
Genre: Erotic, Contemporary Romance
Author: Elizabeth Finn
Release Date: May 23, 2016
Reputation is everything, a fact Keegan Lauri knows all too well. A political PR strategist by trade, he makes his living creating and protecting the image of men, protecting them from women like Gabrielle Kitrick. She’s a threat to every man who falls for her. Beautiful, innocent, young, and available … for a price… Gabe is the shiny little trophy men of power seem to desire. But possessing her is a risk, a risk Keegan is responsible for removing from his client’s life.
He’s not above manipulating her for his own professional gain. He’s not even above seducing her and enjoying every second of it. But he finds out quickly her looks are a façade, and the more he comes to know Gabe, the more difficult it becomes to ignore her humanity. Because behind her beauty and crimson-lipped smile lies a young woman fighting for a better future, a future his very involvement with her jeopardizes.
When Keegan’s professional responsibilities threaten to expose her, will he choose to do his job or protect the young woman he’s become so attached to?
So how much then?”
“How much…?”
“For your lips.”
“They’re not for sale.”
If there’s one thing I know when I pick up a new book by Elizabeth Finn, it’s that angst and a punch straight to the feels is guaranteed. There’s a damn good reason why she’s become my go-to when I’m craving an addicting combination of angst and feelings and she’ll deliver on the promise 100% of the time. Reading the synopsis I knew I was in for one heck of a read and I was not wrong. It’s everything I hoped it would be; seductive, emotional, angsty and hot enough to burn.
Keegan Lauri is ruthless when it comes to his job as a political PR strategist. He will do whatever it takes, even if it requires playing dirty. When he realizes that his new “assignment” happens to have a weakness in the form of the stunning woman that shows up on his arm to a political function, he knows he needs to get rid of her by any means necessary. What he doesn’t expect is to be lured in by her beauty and intriguing vulnerability himself…
“You ARE the secret,” she whispered back.
Gabrielle Kitrick may be my favorite heroine I’ve read of Finn’s in a while. She’s this endearing combination of vulnerability and strength. The way that the author unveils all her layers though each chapter only serves to connect you to her even more. She may be a high priced escort, but she has a damn good reason for doing what she does. She’s not one of those in your face with her sexuality heroines, yet she doesn’t exactly berate herself about it either. When the devastatingly handsome Keegan shows up instead of her ‘client’ and propositions her for a night, the pull between them is too strong for her to refuse and so she gives in.
What begins is a dangerous push and pull between two people that have everything to lose and yet chose to loose themselves in each other. The chemistry between them is undeniable and you can practically feel the electric current that crackles between them. The fact that you’re basically reading the book just waiting for the other shoe to drop makes it for one absolutely unputdownable read.
You know that something will go wrong, but you don’t know when or how. And that particular weight is a shadow over each and every one of their stolen interactions.
The one thing that this author knows how to do amazingly well is give her characters an incredible amount of depth and you certainly feel that with both Keegan and Gabe. Keegan is a wonderfully multi-layered character. He may be ruthless when it comes to his job and he may not be able to control some of the insults that fly out of his mouth in the heat of the moment, but there’s also something so incredibly vulnerable about him too. The way that these emotions of his get unveiled is utterly delicious. With each new chapter brings an added depth to him and you can’t help but fall for him even though you know that he just may be Gabe’s ultimate demise…
This is a story that kept me glued to the pages from beginning to finish. While I knew what was coming, it still managed to pack in a few surprises with the way everything took place. I believe the point is that the reader ultimately knows what would happen and spend the entirety of the book with their heart in their throat waiting for that other shoe to drop. Finn manages to wrangle quite a few emotions in the process making this not only one sizzling read but something beyond your typical escort book. The pacing is perfection, the characters are phenomenally developed and the story itself is purely addicting. If you haven’t read anything by this author yet, I highly suggest you start with this one. I guarantee you that you’ll be hooked. Elizabeth’s brand of angst just works for me and she seriously outdid herself with Kissed. I can’t wait what else she has in store for us with her future releases.
I feel like I’ve been run over by the angst truck. I don’t know whether I want a drink, a hug, or a cigarette. All I know is that I love the absolute hell out of this book and I’m not even a little sorry!
Alright, tell the truth, are you like me and you looked at that cover and blurb and thought to yourself, ‘ah yes, another deliciously irreverent manwhore falls for his best friend sister, fluffy and smutty read. Adding!’
Mister O was a hilarious and deliciously sexy romp from beginning to finish. The characters are perfectly imperfect. The story is addictingly good. It kept me smiling from cover to epilogue. It really doesn’t get much better than this with a rom com! I can’t recommend it enough to any reader that enjoys a good laugh with their steam, because the combination of it here? Perfection!
Do you like broody, protective uber alphas who prefer monosyllabic conversations unless they’re in bed and letting their inner caveman do the talking? Do you like sassy as hell heroines that give as good as they get and have more zingers than an episode of SNL? Do you like a sizzling hot sexual chemistry that brews even hotter with a slow burn sort of pace the author sets? Do you like your erotica written perfectly balanced with an addicting sort of story and a dash of suspense thrown in? Well lucky day! Because do I have the book for you!
If you’ve read the previous books in this series, then you’ll remember Elle Cooper, Tate Cooper’s sister and now James Bowen’s sister-in-law? If you haven’t, no worries, because you can easily read this book as a standalone and not be even slightly lost. Jack Copeland is James’s shadowy and grumpy friend that now has a tie to Elle that he’s not too happy about. The woman infuriates him almost as much as she turns him on. And Elle absolutely loves to tease Jack to within an inch of his sanity.
Jack does an upstanding job avoiding all things Elle, until the day where Elle lands in life threatening trouble and Jack is determined to protect her at all costs. He’ll do his job and walk away afterwards, but Elle is determined to make him lose all reason and patience in the process.
I gobbled up this book with a pervy sort of glee I haven’t felt in a long while. I loved these two together. Nothing beats a good hate/love scenario for me, and boy do these two serve that up on a silver platter. You can’t help but love Elle even if she lands herself in scenarios where you’ll want to throttle her. Jack is everything I love in an alpha; broody, slightly crass, protective, and a dirty, dirty man in bed.
If there’s one thing that Pam Godwin knows, it’s how to write one seriously intense alpha. The mere name alone, Emeric Marceaux, is enough to get my motor revving. This man will give you shivers and you’ll actually feel his intensity crackling through the pages. It’s utterly delicious. He’s a dose of dangerous, with a splash of depraved, and all of it is tied around a sexual magnetism that’s so captivating, your fingers will tingle turning the pages.
Dark Notes is a standalone dark romance with a deliciously kinky element of the forbidden teacher/student. Add in the fact that Ivory is only 17 years old, and you got yourself one crazy ride of a book. But that description doesn’t even begin to do this book justice.
Things begin to simmer between the two of them at first sight, and the author does an incredible job in making the sexual tension practically palpable enough to taste. Emeric is one of the most captivating characters I’ve read in a long while. He oozes sexuality and yet there’s this edge to him that adds an element of fear that just works so well.
While the sexual tension between Ivory and Emeric is instantaneous, that is the only instant thing in this book. The rest is the most delicious sort of slow burn. It’s almost like watching the most sexual game of cat and mouse unfold, and even though you know what the end result will ultimately be, you still can’t stop reading.
If there’s one thing that Lauren Layne knows how to do, it’s to write a swoony, feel-good, and super sexy contemporary romance. Cuff Me just may be my favorite in the series and of course the grumpy Vince is definitely my favorite Moretti brother…so far anyway.
It was a nice change of pace from the typical broody and tortured hero that you normally find in romance these days. After two books of wondering what made Vin tick and made him the man that he is today, I can certainly say I was not left disappointed with the way the author handled it.
#HappyFeels
Sparrow Raynes grew up the daughter of a drunken father who happened to work for one of the most feared men in the Boston underground. But now that man is dead, and his son who’s known to be even more ruthless is to be her husband…and she has no idea why other than it’s been arranged and her father agreed to it. So she’ll do it, but she won’t like it. In her eyes it’ll be a marriage in name only because no way can she give her heart to the devil with the steel-blue eyes that’s known as The Fixer. He’s ruthless, he’s cold-blooded, but she refused to cower from him like even the most deadly of the deadly underground seem to…
Sparrow was exactly the kind of gritty anti-hero that I needed. L.J. Shen was not afraid to stick true to her characters and pulled no punches to do so, and I respect the hell out of her for this. Yes, Troy did some things that may not sit right with some readers, but for this reader, I loved to hate it. See I love when an author takes risks to stay true to the characters and that was definitely the case here. This is no insta lust, insta-love, or insta-anything. Troy and Sparrow’s connection formed over time and it felt authentic because of that. Considering how Troy is and where he came from, I wouldn’t have bought it any other way.
L.J. spared no detail to make her story gritty and real. It was action packed, super sexy, and filled with twists and turns. It was enough to keep me at the edge of my seat the whole time and eagerly turning the pages to see what will happen next. The romance was sizzling hot and together with the plot it all came together perfectly.
My only minor quibble with the book was that it went a little much and too creative with the analogies at times. But that was such a minor thing compared to everything that I loved about it that I barely batted an eyelash at it.
Have you ever read a book that touched you on such a visceral level you almost felt like you were living it along with the characters. Where you felt every emotion, every painful revelation, every bruise and emotional scar? A book that gutted you and at the same time you can’t stop thinking about? A book that you just know will stay with you for a long while yet? Sinner’s Creed was that book to me.
Dirk is a nomad National for Sinner’s Creed MC. He’s the shadow that you don’t see coming, and only see right before your final breath. He’s a third generation, and the MC life is all he knows. He grew up with violence and blood. The club is his life and his salvation. He rides for it, he kills for it, and he knows that eventually he’ll die for it. But then a blonde beauty rocks his world to its very core.
Dirk and Saylor’s relationship may have started off from 60 right away, but there was always something so fateful about it. I was totally buying what the author was selling and man oh man but she sold their love to me. I felt it to my very core. It could have been cheesy or OTT, but it never was. It was beautiful, and real, and authentic. I was eating it up with a spoon and loving every second of it.
