Dollycas’s Thoughts

Undercover security agent Dougal Lockhart has been hired by Euros Vacations to find out who is sabotaging their resorts and tours. Roxie Stanley is on the tour as a mole for one of Eros competitors. They meet on the plane from the U.S. to Great Britain and they are immediately attracted to each other. He has signed a morality clause and is not supposed to fraternize with guests. She needs to complete her mission or she won’t get a promotion. A promotion she needs to pay for her sister’s college tuition. Both of them are keeping secrets but it isn’t long before they can deny their passion. What will happen at the end of this fantasy vacation? Will they tell each other the truth? Can they really build a relationship after just knowing each other for two weeks?

So this story does have a mystery, who is sabotaging Eros Vacations. Are they just pranks or is someone trying to take the company down?

After that, it is a hot, steamy, close to an erotic story that will have you needing a cold beverage and maybe cranking up the air conditioner. I was surprised by the daring sex scenes. A little bondage in a dungeon, quite a bit a role-playing, I mean the guy was dressed as Shakespeare, ala Shakespeare in Love complete with tight leather pants, a couple of encounters in public places, and some sizzling hot romance in her cottage.

I did enjoy that there was a story between all the sex. Dougal seemed always to be one step behind the saboteur, even thinking Roxie could be the one causing trouble. They also step in to help to help with a fencing demonstration when the people hired were unable to perform.

As expected from Harlequin Blaze, this story brought the heat. A spicy read for a cold autumn night. My only complaint, the mystery was not solved by the end of the book.

Well, that went fast.

 

A friends to lovers plot, this one especially egregious in that the H has known the h since she was 14, has been besties with her all that time, neighbors, etc...and has suddenly noticed she has T&A. Oh, he's been celibate for a year due to a training accident. He's a Marine, in whatever their version of special forces is (military guys have to be special forces to qualify for heroes, don'tchaknow). His position is up in the air due to the extent of his injuries (and numbnuts' attempt to force healing by overdoing the therapy, resulting in a strained knee). He's home for...R&R. Heroine was asked by his dad to be his physical therapist.

 

Heroine has been secretly pining for him for years, particularly after a drunken kiss some 12 years ago - which he remembers everything but the identity of the girl. Ironic since he commented to her after a bit of action in a roach coach that he'd held every girl up to that girl's kiss for comparison and they'd all failed.

 

Somewhere along the line, she comments that the whole town has set her up to be the next resident spinster. Gauntlet dropped.

 

The initial "plan" was for him to give her ah...tips? during the 2 weeks in exchange for her physical therapy. The book took place over just a few days, during which...a former friend/rival/douchebag who'd had a thing for the h's sister and had attempted sexual assault on said sister(only to be interrupted by H) some years previous, attempted to get revenge on the H by attacking the h (who used to play softball and found a handy bit of pipe or something). This of course, forced the H to confront his feelings for the h.

 

So why 4 stars? Characters are actually likable. Story isn't unduly contrived. I mean; I suppose if you could ignore that he'd apparently failed to notice the h being female in 18 years - or at least, a female to bone... And maybe his being celibate for a year made him a little (or a lot) desperate whether he acknowledged it or not. And he gave thought to that - that his lack of action in the last year made him see his bestie in ways he hadn't before...or was it feel? After all, his first thought after she left following a welcoming hug and a chat was that she had tits. So I dunno. It was an easy read and I didn't put it down mentally rewriting it with myself as the h with the H writhing in pain at my feet and clutching his groin. :D

Smokin'

 

First one of these friends-to-lovers books that I haven't spent half of it muttering invectives at one of the MCs.

 

H loves the h. He knows it, he's known it for some time. But she's shown reluctance to move past friendship and he doesn't want to lose her completely.

 

h is having difficulties of late - she keeps remembering a party a few years back where they'd come close to ah...doing it. She doesn't want to mess the friendship up though, because for several weeks after the incident (which she'd come to her senses and stopped before tab A got anywhere near slot B), he'd been cranky and had avoided her. She's a bit slow on the uptake. She's attracted, but in her mind, feels like she came on to him and that anything more will screw things up.

 

They have a little smoking issue. He loses a bet so they attend a hypnotherapist who gets them mixed up with a newlywed couple who're having...difficulties. The unsafe word is "underwear" - a bad thing since they're working on an advertising project for a company that makes sexy...underwear. This causes some hilarity initially as the poor h is affected by this (the H apparently wasn't open for that particular suggestion) and well, she seems to have little inhibition when the word is uttered. Eventually though, he is clued in - by the hypnotherapist who asks him how everything is going, which is when they figure out the mixup.

 

Much soul searching and a visit to said hypnotherapist later, she's figured things out for herself and corners in his lair where he's hiding, feeling sorry for himself. A bit of hanky-panky and a ring later, HEA.

 

Highlights - likable couple. Did I mention smokin'? I meant the steamy version; not the one they originally sought the hypnotherapist for.

 

Low-lights - was he really willing to play third wheel if it meant being able to be around her? The narrative was like, you know, being in someone's, I dunno, head. (yes; there were places it was written like that). Ok, thinking about that, we are theoretically supposed to be in someone's head but it shouldn't be so choppy there. Speech I can see.

I've spent the last 7 days staring at it balefully. The back cover reads interesting. But then you get to the set-up...and the end.

 

The h was kidnapped as a teen, along with her cousin. She escaped, her cousin...didn't. She sort of got over that, only to get kidnapped *again* while in college, by a couple of fellow students. So she's become agoraphobic - supposedly. Daddy Warbucks has surrounded his precious darling with ex agents and military types, under the guise of well, household employees. She lives "alone" and is clueless of this.

 

The H is one of these - her chauffeur. He finds the whole thing stupid - he wouldn't mind the elaborate security if it was a head of state, but some pampered princess? Yes, he does hold her in contempt. He's worked for her for a few months. She is attracted to him, and he's aware of it, also finds it amusing.

 

Her therapist suggests a kidnapping for hire adventure to help her with her phobia.

 

He listens in on her telling her friend about it, does research (which he apparently left lying around)

 

She meets her dad for dinner at a restaurant, which is cleared in advance of their arrival, sees pity in the H's eyes, and decides to go through with it.

 

H's brother is worthless pondscum that the H has been bailing out since they were kids. He finds the "research" and decides to fill in...or arrange a fill in - I quit at this point - because he owes some bookie a lot of money.

 

Since I read the last few chapters as well...the h apparently only found out that her staff were all security people after she more or less rescued herself, because her dad was incensed and blamed the H for everything. The H kept to his cover as hapless chauffeur the entire time he was in her presence, and didn't take the opportunity to take care of the bad guys when he had several chances. No - I didn't understand that. She was in her room, he could have taken them out one by one, and solved the whole problem. Granted, he likely wouldn't have killed his brother but still...

 

The part I didn't read - the middle - I can only guess that...the kidnapping happened, he allowed himself to be captured assuming it was just a game, slept with the h (that he considered useless and pitiable), figured out it wasn't a game, didn't do anything about it until AFTER they'd reached the Caymans and she'd been dragged off the boat (read *that* part), etc.

I had difficulty getting into this one.

 

The H...eh. He was intense. I get that at least some of it might have been because of his military position. He had his moments that I wanted to you know, knee him one.

 

The h OTOH... Ok, she comes from a well-off family. She's a reiki healer whatever that is - she has a gift, so this is how she chose to work with it. Why she didn't take up therapeutic massage, I dunno. Seems like being in a respected medical field would have been safer. She ran into trouble in her home "town" of Boston in that she set up shop as a new age healer, her shop was vandalized, and the cop who approached had mob connections. Eventually, she snuck off during the night. She really didn't do much to cover her tracks though - any half-assed internet search could have found her.

 

I don't know that I would necessarily say TSTL, but pretty danged naive and clueless anyway.

 

So she moved into the apartment below the H, and set up her shop next door. His pacing (he was on leave due to injuries) woke her up, so she goes to visit him - in a tank and a pair of boxers? She did have the thought briefly that she maybe should have covered up more but nah; all her parts are covered, she's good. He assumed she was offering.

She gives him a treatment the next day, they kiss, and he makes some derogatory remark about her not being exactly stacked. He comes onto her the next day? That evening? Whatever, she's once again wearing sleep clothes.

 

She suggests sex like...the next day...because of the chemistry ya know. Much making out happens. He gets back from training and bangs her again - with his buddies working in the shop next door. Of course, he's had a background check run on her because something seems off. Funny that if he'd grabbed those newspapers she had packing her stock, he could have connected at least one dot.

 

The bad guys move in, because she had done such a good job of covering her tracks <sarcasm> that it seemingly took them a few weeks. Of course she's concerned that the H and his buddies might be in trouble (delta force? not likely) going against the crooked cop and his mob buddies. I had to laugh at that one.

 

I'd probably knee him harder if I didn't suspect he was trying to scare her off. Since she didn't seem to pick up on what he was doing, I just want to smack her with a clue-by-four.