This review is from 2019 and is kept here for reference. Titles, prices and availability may have changed.
Tijan
Book ArchiveContemporarySuspenseMolten
There were always whispers about my roommate at Hillcrest Academy.
The wealthiest of the wealthy sent their kids to our boarding school, and Brooke Bennett had been at the top, though I never quite knew why. She was fun and outgoing, but she kept quiet about her family. The only things she showed me were photographs of her brothers.
I became fascinated with her second-oldest brother. Kai Bennett.
He was the most of them all. Smoldering. Hypnotic. Alluring.
Kai had eyes that pulled me in and a face that haunted my dreams.
Then I met him.
He came to our school with their father, and that’s when I learned what kind of family Brooke came from. They were mafia, and Brooke’s oldest brother was dead. Her father said accident, but Brooke said murder.
Three months later, her father died, and Kai became the head of the Bennett Family. Brooke left Hillcrest for good, and that was the last time I saw her.
Fourteen years later, I’m staring at her face on the television. Brooke is missing.
Two days later, Kai Bennett kidnaps me.
Tijan wrote another awesome mafia book. I loved Riley and Kai together, watching Riley soften Kai’s edges, but also showing how tough she can be. I’m all for a strong hero, but catching glimpses of their softer sides with family and the woman they’re falling for just makes me swoon. Riley had this love/hate deal with Kai ever since she was a teen, and she tried hard to deny her attraction to him because she did not want to become involved with a mafia killer. The main plot of the story had me hooked from page 1, but Tijan snuck in these side stories that had you sitting there in awe. I don’t know how she keeps surprising me, but I’m a lifelong 1-clicker for her books. I really hope this book doesn’t stay as a standalone, I loved being in this new world and the Bennett family.
A taste
He pushed all the darkness away. It didn't matter in that moment that he was the reason it was there in the first place.
When his lips touched mine, flames surged, and I gasped into his mouth. His tongue slid inside. Everything exploded, and I felt his tongue searching for mine as his fingers began to thrust.
My voice dropped to a whisper. "You made me feel special, and loved, and beautiful, and you did all of it withought saying a word. There were no proclamations. I just knew. I felt it. It was everything I never felt growing up. You knew me before I realized it."