ARC Review: Ice by Chelsea Camaron & Jessie Lane

Ice is the first book in the Regulators Series by Chelsea Camaron and Jessie Lane. While this book can be read as a standalone, fans of Chelsea and Jessie's will recognize some familiar faces from Chelsea's Hellions Ride Series and Jessie's Ex Ops Series. Having enjoyed books from both of these authors, I couldn't wait to dive into this one. I thought that it was a great start to this series, and I am really looking forward to getting to know the rest of the Regulators.

Morgan Powell is a twenty-four year old virgin that spends most of her time trying to advance her career as an investment banker. She was raised by parents that were more into appearances than the well being of their three daughters. When her parents kick one of her younger sisters out of the house, Morgan agrees to let her sister stay with her. When her sister Madyson and her best friend Brooke start getting into trouble though, she comes face to face with Brooke's father and they immediately get off on the wrong foot. Brett "Ice" Grady thinks that Morgan is doing a horrible job with her sister, and Morgan thinks that Ice is a total jerk. But the more they around each other, the more they begin to realize that there is more between them than just arguments. When something horrible happens, they discover that they are better together than apart.

I really liked Ice. At first he seemed to be a complete jerk, especially when it came to Morgan. But I really understood that he was doing the best he could to look out for his daughter. As a single father from a young age, he had been forced to deal with a lot more than he ever should have and it was clear that Brooke was his whole world. I loved that he started to really see that he had made some bad assumptions though as he got to know more about Morgan and her situation. Ice was a complete alpha that wouldn't apologize for who he was, but he was honest and upfront. It was also really great to see a MC male that was capable of being faithful, and I loved his character all the more for it. Morgan was strong and sweet, and I was really glad to see her determined to look out for her sisters. She was doing everything that she could to change her relationship with Madyson and show her what being a family should be like. But I really loved her relationship with Brooke. They clicked pretty quickly, and I really enjoyed seeing how she didn't try to take her mother's place or treat her as a child. She was respectful and let their relationship develop naturally, and I thought that she was perfect for both Ice and Brooke. Morgan and Ice had amazing chemistry and were super hot together, even though it took awhile for anything to actually happen between them. I enjoyed the build-up and the tension though, and it was good to see them developing a connection beyond just a physical level.
Overall, this was a great start to the Regulators series and I am really excited to see where it goes from here. I liked Ice and Morgan, but I really liked the secondary characters as well. I have to say that I am excited about Hammer's story, but I absolutely cannot wait to get to know Coal better. After reading about him in this book, I really loved his character! He was such a great guy when it came to helping Morgan and Madyson, and I just know that there is so much to him. I definitely recommend this book, and I think that this will appeal to more than just the typical MC fans. I think that if you like MC books you will like this one, but those that are a bit skeptical because of cheating and some typical MC type behavior have nothing to fear with this story. If you haven't read anything by Chelsea Camaron and/or Jessie Lane, I think that this is a great place to start but would recommend both the Hellions Ride and Ex Ops series as well.

**ARC Provided by Between the Sheets Promotions**

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ARC Review: Stripping Her Defenses by Jessie Lane

I was really looking forward to reading Stripping Her Defenses after reading the blurb. I love a good second chance lovers story, and the fact that it had bikers in it was even better. That being said, I feel like this book was a bit different than the blurb implied. It was still a good story, it just wasn't exactly what I had thought it was going to be. Stripper Her Defenses is the second book in Jessie Lane's Ex Ops series, but these can each be read as standalones.

After losing her unborn son and struggling to cope by herself, Kara Sullivan left her husband to find herself and start over. She loved her husband, but with him never home and her always alone she knew that she couldn't stay anymore despite her feelings for him. So eight years later, the last person she expects to see walk into the strip club where she is dancing is Riley Sullivan. Riley has been unable to forget the only woman he ever loved, but he has stopped trying to contact her after being told that doing so was damaging to her health and mental state. But now that he has found her, he will do anything to show her that they belong together. Not only must Riley convince Kara to give them another chance, but he must also keep her away from the danger of his current mission. Can Riley and Kara find their way back to one another? Or will the pain from their past and the danger in their present keep them from giving things between them another shot?

I liked Riley and Kara. They were good characters that had been through a lot. They had married young and had both made mistakes. Instead of talking to one another and supporting each other, they had done what they thought was best at the time. Their relationship was proof that communication can change everything when it comes to making a marriage work. I didn't really understand them though. I couldn't figure out why Riley thought that Kara wouldn't be hurt and upset by him always being gone and choosing to take mission after mission, knowing that he was never around. And I really didn't understand why Kara never said anything to him about it upsetting her and that she feared he didn't want to be around her anymore. I really just found it completely immature on both of their parts, and it seemed like behavior that you would expect from much younger people rather than they were. I thought that they had a lot of history and a lot of chemistry, but their relationship needed a lot of work.

While I thought that this story was a good quick and easy read, I also felt like it had a few issues. Besides the communication between the characters, I honestly felt like this one was wrapped up far too quickly. I enjoyed the length of the book, but it just seemed as though Riley and Kara solved all their problems far too easily. They basically had a few words and jumped back into bed with one another, and all of a sudden all their problems seemed to go away. I just didn't care for it, and I thought it just seemed to easy. I wanted them to really work at it and see that they had made the effort and steps to make it work this time around. I thought that it was a good story, and I did believe that Kara and Riley belonged together. I just thought that the time frame was a bit too soon, and it all felt a bit rushed to me. I do like the characters in this series though, and I am interested to see more of them as this series progresses. I will read more from Jessie Lane in the future.

**ARC Provided by Between the Sheets Promotions**

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ARC Review: Secret Maneuvers by Jessie Lane

The blurb for this book sounded promising and right up my alley: hot ex-Special Ops hero, suspense, and a reunion romance with all the angst that comes along with it? I’m sold! But while I found the premise promising, I found the execution somewhat underwhelming. SECRET MANEUVERS, the first book in the Ex-Ops series, finds itself in that awkward space between romantic suspense and contemporary romance (of the Southern persuasion) that is notoriously difficult to navigate. I have seen seasoned romantic suspense authors fail to impress in this niche, and the writing team that is newbie author Jessie Lane doesn’t fare much better.

Hero Bobby Baker was the golden boy of a small Georgia town: star football player, academic superstar, practically engaged to his high school sweetheart from the wrong side of the tracks, and with a life in the Army all planned out. Annabelle (Belle) Smith was the girl from the trailer park with an abusive, alcoholic father who couldn’t truly believe Bobby would love someone like her and whose only life prospect was to wait for him to finish his Army training and take her away from her desolate home life. Their teenage selves are a romantic’s dream: he’s her knight in shining armour and she’s his first love and reason for being. The book’s prologue does an excellent job of setting up this dynamic, the intensity of feelings both have for each other, and the HEA they’ve planned together. And then Bobby, in a fit of teenage idiocy and overwhelmed by all the new experiences and encounters of Army training, writes Belle a Dear Jane letter that shatters her faith in love and leaves her completely alone out in the cold. Immediately after sending the letter, Bobby realises he’s been an idiot and writes a second letter taking everything back and expressing his undying love… but Belle has taken off for parts unknown. Fifteen years of radio silence and wallowing in mistakes later and—unbeknownst to either of them—Bobby is part of a secret black ops team and Belle a badass ATF agent based in Texas assigned to the same investigation of a gun-running Mexican cartel. The attraction between them is still scorching and Bobby is determined to make Belle his again, but she’s still hurt from his having dumped her so callously and is keeping secrets. Angst, drama, sexy-times, and some action ensue.

Though the characters were three-dimensional and well developed, my biggest problem is that I couldn’t really connect with the hero and heroine. Bobby had a bit too much of that alpha swagger and wounded male pride that edged sexy over into almost overbearing and possessive. The way he thought of Belle as undeniably ‘his’ after having ditched her (knowing her abandonment issues)—even if it was the biggest mistake of his life—grated on me, though I did appreciate his single-minded determination to get her to at least listen to his apology. It also irked me that he expected a simple apology to make things right between them so they could pick up where they’d been fifteen years ago, and I was repeatedly tempted to forcibly remove his head from his ass when dealing with ‘the secret’. Sure, he can abandon the love of his life when she was most vulnerable and expect her to forgive and forget, but she’s not entitled to some mistakes of her own… double standard, much? Belle was a study in contradictions, and a complete emotional pushover for a purportedly badass ATF agent. She had an incredibly rough childhood and as result has major abandonment issues and has made some less-than-stellar choices in her life, but after an initial resistance to Bobby’s advances, she lets him walk all over her. The two of them have a boatload of regrets, mistakes, and lies to deal with that make for some great angst, but the way they dealt with their issues on their way to their HEA didn’t resonate with me. The book is written in first-person (generally not my favourite) and alternates between Bobby’s and Annabelle’s POVs within the same chapter, which—while nice because we get to see what each character is thinking/feeling (and there is a lot of internalizing of emotions)—was at times a bit jarring.

Overall, SECRET MANEUVERS was an okay read for me that didn’t quite live up to its potential. It does have great secondary characters and an excellent dynamic between the boys on the Ex-Ops team that make good fodder for future books, and I will likely look for the next entry in the series to learn the stories of the other Ex-Ops members. Especially the commander’s.

**ARC provided by Author**

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Feature and Giveaway: Secret Maneuvers by Jessie Lane

Some mistakes from the past haunt us forever... unless fate steps in with a second chance.

One 'dear John' letter haunts Bobby Baker's every living moment. It’s the letter he stupidly wrote to his high school sweetheart, Belle, right after he left to join the Army. The letter that he told her that he wasn't so sure if they were ready for forever yet. But before he can let her know that the letter, and his second thoughts, are nothing but a mistake, she up and disappears from the small Georgia town they were both raised in.

Fifteen years later, Belle unknowingly walks back into Bobby's life when her job as an ATF Agent forces her to work with a group of men secretly headed by the CIA to help her track down whoever is involved in funneling black market weapons to a drug cartel in Mexico.

Bobby will use this mission to try and soothe Belle's hurt feelings while proving to her that their love is still meant for forever. He'll use every dirty trick he's learned since he joined the Army to maneuver her back into his life for the long haul. But Belle's not making it easy as she keeps him at arm's length in the hopes that mistakes of her own never come to light.

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