Forever Romance | July 28, 2015 | Contemporary Romance
New York's Finest, book 1
★★★★★
SOURCE: TASTY BOOK TOURS
After a photograph of Luc Moretti saving a tourist hits social media, he instantly becomes New York's most famous and beloved cop. When a major network decides to run a special on the "American Hero," Luc's boss gives him no choice but to cooperate in the name of good exposure for the department. Luc doesn't mind the celebrity status-what he does mind is the gorgeous brunette journalist who's been assigned to follow his every move. Especially since she also happens to be the same knockout that rejected him rather publicly the week before.
Ava Sims is a woman who gets what she wants. And what she wants is to be CBC's lead anchor-but to get there, she'll need to nail the fluff piece on the playboy cop. Luc Moretti is everything Ava knows to stay away from: a stubborn charmer with a hero-complex. But the more Ava gets to know Luc and his oddball family, the more she realizes that beneath the swagger and the blue uniform is a complex man who makes her heart beat too fast. Soon, Ava's doing the unthinkable, and falling for the best of New York's finest ...
{ about lauren layne } .
Lauren Layne is the USA Today Bestselling author of contemporary romance.Prior to becoming an author, Lauren worked in e-commerce and web-marketing. In 2011, she and her husband moved from Seattle to New York City, where Lauren decided to pursue a full-time writing career. It took six months to get her first book deal (despite ardent assurances to her husband that it would only take three). Since then, Lauren's gone on to publish ten books, including the bestselling Stiletto series, with several more on the way in 2015.
Lauren currently lives in Chicago with her husband and spoiled Pomeranian. When not writing, you'll find her at happy hour, running at a doggedly slow pace, or trying to straighten her naturally curly hair.
{ excerpt } .
Luc stifled the smile, letting his former scowl resettle on his face. If Lopez thought he was being played, there was no way he’d go for it.
“Hey, so Cap said the hot reporter would be doing ride-alongs with us. That’ll be cool,” Lopez said.
“Seriously? You hate ride-alongs,” Luc said.
Lopez held up a finger. “No, I hate the dippy, I-wanna-be-a-cop-someday type of ride-alongs. Those stupid kids are always offering advice when they don’t know shit about shit. But Ms. Sims will be a nice kind of ride-along. Just sitting, observing…looking fine…”
Luc withheld the snort. If Lopez thought Ava wouldn’t be offering plenty of unsolicited advice, he had an unpleasant surprise. He doubted mind your own business was in her DNA, not to mention it was a blatant contradiction of her job description.
“Hot or not, same rules apply,” Luc said, just to set the record straight. “She can come on the tame ride-alongs. That’s it.”
“Shit, and here I was planning to bring her to a shoot-out,” Lopez mused.
Luc flung the paperclip back at his partner, nailing him in the forehead. “Hey. So, I need you to be my wingman.”
Lopez rubbed the red spot to the right of his temple with a knowing grin. “Ah, so you do want a piece of Miss Media.”
Yes.
No!
Damn it.
“Let me rephrase,” Luc said, sitting back in his chair. “I need you to be my reverse wingman. Do whatever you need to keep that plastic, nosy diva away from me.”
There was a light tap on his shoulder before a female voice spoke up. “Gonna be hard when this nosy diva is hell-bent on getting all up in your business.”
Whoops.
“Nice job, Wingman,” Luc said with a glare at Lopez, whose grin indicated that he’d definitely seen Ava approaching and had opted not to mention it.
Luc pivoted around in his chair so he faced Ava. Only he was sitting, and she was standing, which put him exactly at eye level with Ava’s slim hips.
Generally speaking, Luc liked a little more curve to his women, but apparently his preferences were shifting, because he couldn’t help his sex-starved brain from thinking that Ava Sims’s hips were the perfect size for his hands to wrap around, his fingers holding her still as he prepared to plunge into her…
The fantasy dissolved into a million pieces when she opened her sassy mouth again.
“You know…” her voice was considering, her finger tapping idly against her lips. “I’d always heard that the whole man-in-uniform thing was supposed to be a turn-on. Guess it’s an acquired taste.”
{ review } .
Lauren Layne is bringing a new series out, and it's starting out with a bang.
Granted, I don't know that I'll ever dislike Lauren's writing. Her characters are always developed, the plot always interesting, and her females? They're always lovable and spunky and just plain fun.
FRISK ME is book one in Lauren's newest NEW YORK'S FINEST series (coming from a new Chicagoan, mind you) and from what I can tell, it looks like it may be following the police family of Moretti siblings. Book one belongs to bambino Luca "Luc" Moretti -- the youngest brother. In his opinion, he's the one with the most to prove. Everyone else has great careers and he's just an officer -- an officer who lost his partner in the line of duty and has demons involving a peanut of a child.
But when he's trying to deal with all of this, he manages to be the spotlight police officer in a YouTube video gone viral, and now he's recognized everywhere when he just wants people to leave him the heck alone.
Now, the local news station wants to do a 3-day series on him and sends reporter Ava Sims to follow him for a few weeks. Problem number one? Ava and Luc went head to head a while back over a parking ticket. Problem number two? Luc simply doesn't want the spotlight.
Ava and Luc bicker non-stop and it's super fun.
"Well here's your chance to thank me," Luc said, ignoring her sarcasm. "It would also be a good time to apologize for physically assaulting an officer of the law."
Okay, so assault was a strong word. But she'd touched him. He definitely remembered her touching him.
Her eyes narrowed. "Never happened. You're confused. Must be the super-high from too many doughnuts."
Or even:
"Just think, two whole months together!" she said with a mockingly bright smile meant to annoy him. "Won't that be fun? You can show me all the lives you've saved with those parking tickets."
Luc and Ava (except Luc only ever refers to her as Sims -- chalk it up to cop-talk and/or treating her like 'one of the guys') are constantly at one another's throats... until they give in to the mind blowing chemistry. Part of the reason they butt heads so badly is, in my opinion, they're very similar. Both are kind of the black sheep of their family, and both are 100% adamant about never getting married. Neither wants marriage. Neither wants kids. Both are happy being single the rest of their lives, with a date thrown in here or there (...gah, I can't wait to watch these two continue to grow through the series).
On Ava's first ride-along with Luc and Lopez, she realizes that to get the story she wants, she's going to need to get deeper into what makes Luc, well... Luc. She wants to unearth what makes him tick, what makes him happy, and needs to know about his... social-ness. She truly believes when she sets out to do the story that Luc likes the attention he's received, but covers it up; however, she starts to notice little things like his forced smiles and she begins to question everything -- exactly what Luc was afraid of happening.
When Luc kisses Ava for the first time, it's simply to ward off a badge bunny -- after which he tells her he "likes her mouth a hell of a lot better when it's not yapping", as if that's the only reason.
Yeah, ok, Luc.
Ava and Luc bicker non-stop and it's super fun.
"Well here's your chance to thank me," Luc said, ignoring her sarcasm. "It would also be a good time to apologize for physically assaulting an officer of the law."
Okay, so assault was a strong word. But she'd touched him. He definitely remembered her touching him.
Her eyes narrowed. "Never happened. You're confused. Must be the super-high from too many doughnuts."
Or even:
"Just think, two whole months together!" she said with a mockingly bright smile meant to annoy him. "Won't that be fun? You can show me all the lives you've saved with those parking tickets."
Luc and Ava (except Luc only ever refers to her as Sims -- chalk it up to cop-talk and/or treating her like 'one of the guys') are constantly at one another's throats... until they give in to the mind blowing chemistry. Part of the reason they butt heads so badly is, in my opinion, they're very similar. Both are kind of the black sheep of their family, and both are 100% adamant about never getting married. Neither wants marriage. Neither wants kids. Both are happy being single the rest of their lives, with a date thrown in here or there (...gah, I can't wait to watch these two continue to grow through the series).
On Ava's first ride-along with Luc and Lopez, she realizes that to get the story she wants, she's going to need to get deeper into what makes Luc, well... Luc. She wants to unearth what makes him tick, what makes him happy, and needs to know about his... social-ness. She truly believes when she sets out to do the story that Luc likes the attention he's received, but covers it up; however, she starts to notice little things like his forced smiles and she begins to question everything -- exactly what Luc was afraid of happening.
When Luc kisses Ava for the first time, it's simply to ward off a badge bunny -- after which he tells her he "likes her mouth a hell of a lot better when it's not yapping", as if that's the only reason.
Yeah, ok, Luc.
Speaking of great chemistry, there is chemistry popping off the pages all over the place. Luc's current partner is a hoot and a half. Lopez has a lady-killer smile and is certainly good with them, too. Luc would rather Lopez took on the America's Hero role, to be honest.
"Dude. You never said she was hot."
"Who's hot?" Luc asked.
Lopez threw a paperclip at Luc, hitting him squarely in the chest. "Don't insult our friendship."
Luc grunted. It was bad enough that he had to put up with Ava Sims for the next few weeks; he drew the line at discussing her almost painfully good looks with Sawyer.
Granted, Luc has a hard time with this new partnership because he was extremely close to his last partner, and Luc holds a lot of guilt when it comes to Mike and Mike's family.
Ava has an awesome friendship with Beth, too. I truly enjoyed their interactions and discussions about Ava's overbearing mother and the good-looking cop that Ava wishes she wasn't attracted to -- because why the heck couldn't she be attracted to Lopez? But noooo, she has to like the rude one.
This was so not the time to be playing sexy-eyes with a grumpy cop.
The Moretti family as a whole is so much fun to read about and I can't wait to watch this Italian family continue to fall. Lauren Layne does relationships, friendships, and families so flipping well -- and there's a lot of 'so flipping well' in FRISK ME! Side note? My goodness, I can't wait for Anth's story! The little snippet at the end of FRISK ME is super fun (Moretti family Sunday breakfast, yo!) and his interactions with Maggie.... Oh, I'm so excited to watch that happen.
"Dude. You never said she was hot."
"Who's hot?" Luc asked.
Lopez threw a paperclip at Luc, hitting him squarely in the chest. "Don't insult our friendship."
Luc grunted. It was bad enough that he had to put up with Ava Sims for the next few weeks; he drew the line at discussing her almost painfully good looks with Sawyer.
Granted, Luc has a hard time with this new partnership because he was extremely close to his last partner, and Luc holds a lot of guilt when it comes to Mike and Mike's family.
Ava has an awesome friendship with Beth, too. I truly enjoyed their interactions and discussions about Ava's overbearing mother and the good-looking cop that Ava wishes she wasn't attracted to -- because why the heck couldn't she be attracted to Lopez? But noooo, she has to like the rude one.
This was so not the time to be playing sexy-eyes with a grumpy cop.
The Moretti family as a whole is so much fun to read about and I can't wait to watch this Italian family continue to fall. Lauren Layne does relationships, friendships, and families so flipping well -- and there's a lot of 'so flipping well' in FRISK ME! Side note? My goodness, I can't wait for Anth's story! The little snippet at the end of FRISK ME is super fun (Moretti family Sunday breakfast, yo!) and his interactions with Maggie.... Oh, I'm so excited to watch that happen.
I'd give up being everyone else's hero, if you'll just let me be yours.
{ giveaway } .
Thank you for hosting FRISK ME!! So happy you enjoyed!
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