Lace
Waking up without any memory of who I was in a place with people who didn’t know me would have been terrifying if it hadn’t been for him. The comfort I felt when he was close by pushed other darkness away. Memories slowly fighting to return, haunting images, fear that crawled closer every day until he showed up with a book by my bedside to read to me. I didn’t care what he read, just hearing his deep southern drawl ran off the monsters lurking in the shadows of my mind. Luther Levine was my hero.
Luther
My life was what I’d made it. The one I wanted, and I was real damn happy with it. Until I found a woman with a pair of the prettiest eyes I’d ever seen staring up at me beaten and broken behind a dumpster. For the first time in my life, someone needed me. What was even more shocking was I wanted her to need me. I wasn’t planning on keeping her. She was too young. The age gap too big. But when they came to take her from me, the urge to fight back clawed at my chest. Just when I accepted I couldn’t let her go… we found out who she was. Not because her memory returned. It was her DNA that dropped the bomb on us all. The outcome was one hell of a mess.
Review:
At 84% I was a *little* concerned that this was going to end up being a part 1 of 2–no fears, though! It’s a complete story <3
Though Luther often put me off with his tendency to refer to any of his fellow Mafia who have fallen in love as being “locked down to one c*nt,” I really did enjoy his story in the end. No one deserves an HEA more than Lace (she also needs a whole lot of therapy, and I sincerely hope she’ll get that too), and Luther really is the guy who does it for her.
And fortunately, he does get over his “locked down” mentality once he realizes he has actually fallen into feelings for her.
Amnesia plots can be tricky, but I thought Ms Glines did a nice job with it here. I’ll admit I was surprised about what they learned about her even before she got her memories back–I absolutely was not expecting that reveal!–and though I’d love to have seen her non-romance relationships develop more fully than we did, I understand why the Luther/Lace one took precedence. (To be clear I don’t want less of them, I’m advocating for more book here ;))
Hell of a Mess is the 8th book in the series, and though it will of course give you a better picture overall if you’ve read all the previous books, Lace and Luther’s story’s plot stands on its own fairly well and *could* be read as a standalone if you want.
Rating: 4 stars / A-
I voluntarily reviewed an Advance Reader Copy of this book.
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