Aurora Rose Reynolds | February 2, 2016 | Genre
Underground Kings, book 3
★★★★1/2
SOURCE: TRSOR PROMOTIONS
Distraction: The great intensity, novelty, or attractiveness of something other than the object of attention.Sven is a man who takes pride in his ability to separate himself from his emotions. He's a man who knows who he is and where he’s going in life, a man who needs no one, because needing someone, anyone, is a weakness.His past taught him love isn’t enough.Maggie wants the happily ever after, but has never picked the right men, or stuck around long enough, to build a forever. It’s always been easier to get out early, before emotions make things messy.When Maggie wakes up naked in Sven’s bed, with no memory of the night before, these two must be honest about their feelings and face their fears, so they can build a future together.Will love be enough for them to get their happy ending together, or will a threat from outside strike them down before they ever have a chance?
{ about aurora rose reynolds } .
Aurora Rose Reynolds is a navy brat who's husband served in the United States Navy. She has lived all over the country but now resides in New York City with her Husband and pet fish. She's married to an alpha male that loves her as much as the men in her books love their women. He gives her over the top inspiration everyday. In her free time she reads, writes and enjoys going to the movies with her husband and cookie. She also enjoys taking mini weekend vacations to nowhere, or spends time at home with friends and family. Last but not least she appreciates everyday and admires it's beauty.
Aurora Rose Reynolds is a navy brat who's husband served in the United States Navy. She has lived all over the country but now resides in New York City with her Husband and pet fish. She's married to an alpha male that loves her as much as the men in her books love their women. He gives her over the top inspiration everyday. In her free time she reads, writes and enjoys going to the movies with her husband and cookie. She also enjoys taking mini weekend vacations to nowhere, or spends time at home with friends and family. Last but not least she appreciates everyday and admires it's beauty.
{ excerpt } .
“Fuck no,” I snap, loosening my tie. The last assistant I had ended up being a clusterfuck. The woman was pissed that I wouldn’t fuck her. I finally had to fire her ass when she brought another woman up to my office and proceeded to try and get me to join them on my couch when I walked in on them half naked. Work is work. Yes, I might invite women up to fuck, but never anyone I work with.“It’s not like she’s your type,” he says, and I feel my jaw tick. “Besides, if she’s up here with you, she’ll stop harassing the women down there.” He nods toward where she’s sitting and my eyes follow the movement, seeing her talking to a girl who looks a little startled by whatever it is Maggie is telling her.
“It’s not happening. You guys need to keep her out of the club,” I tell him, turning away from the window.
“Just saying it would be a good way to keep an eye on her,” he gripes, patting my shoulder before leaving my office and closing the door behind him.
Letting out a frustrated breath, I turn away from the window and try to focus on all the shit I need to get done.
“Yeah,” I pick up my desk phone when it beeps and looking at the clock, seeing that an hour has passed since Teo left.
“Look out your window,” Zack says, and I spin my chair around and scan the floor, wondering what he wants me to see. Then I spot Maggie with a man’s head tucked under her arm as she leads him toward the front of the club, with Lane and Zack following closely behind them.
“What the fuck is going on?”
“That guy tried to put something in some chick’s drink, and Maggie saw him and went postal on his ass,” he explains almost proudly.
“Jesus Christ, what the fuck do I pay you for?” I gripe.
“I saw the whole thing. I was getting ready to step in when she stood up on her barstool, jumped on the guy’s back, and then did some fucking ninja shit, wrapping her arm around the guy’s head and forcing him to his knees. She won’t let him go. She said she wants to ask him some questions.”
“I’m on my way down,” I say, slamming down the phone and jerking open the door to my office, taking the stairs two at a time. Reaching the front of the club, I see Zack holding the guy and Lane’s arms wrapped around Maggie’s waist, trying to drag her away. What the fuck is going on?” I roar, and all eyes come to me except Maggie’s, who takes the opportunity to grab the man’s ear and twist, making him drop hard to the ground on his knees.
“You think it’s funny to drug innocent women, you flaming turd bucket?” she yells, hitting the top of the guy’s bald head, and Zack chuckles along with Lane, but I don’t see one damn thing that’s funny about this shit.
“Maggie, let him go and come here,” I growl, and she raises her eyes to meet mine, looking startled.
“He—”
“I said get your ass over here now!” I yell, cutting her off and feeling the vein in my neck bulge as I point to the ground at my feet.
“Fine.” She pouts, letting the guy go, walking sullenly toward me as Zack pulls the man to his feet, taking him with him around the corner, with Lane following behind them with his phone to his ear. I’m sure they are going to have a talk and wait for the cops.
“Let’s go,” I say, wrapping my hand around the back of her neck, leading her through the club and up the stairs to my office. Sitting her in the chair in front of my desk, I walk over to the cabinets where I keep my personal bottle of scotch and pull out the cap. I then lift the bottle to my lips, taking a swig while trying to calm down.
“Alcohol isn’t good for you,” she informs me as I take a seat behind my desk.
“Do I look like I give a fuck about that?” I ask her, taking another swig.
“You might not care about what it can do to your body right now, but you may want to know that it lowers sperm count and stamina in the long run.”
“Jesus.” I shake my head and rub my eyes in aggravation.
“Just saying it’s not good for you,” she mutters, dropping her eyes to her lap.
“What happened downstairs isn’t okay, Mags.”
“Maggie,” she corrects, still not looking at me.
“Whatever,” I drone, taking another swig. “You could have gotten hurt.”
“I have a black belt—”
“Look at me,” I demand, cutting her off and slamming the bottle down on the top of the desk, waiting for her eyes to meet mine. “You could have gotten hurt or worse. Do you understand that? He could have had a weapon on him.”
“You don’t understand,” she whispers as tears fill her eyes, but I harden myself against them, needing her to understand this isn’t a fucking movie. This is real life, and there are bad—really fucking bad—people in this world.
“You’re not allowed on the club floor anymore,” I state firmly.
“I’m going to find the guys who hurt my sister,” she states, and I see the determination in her eyes that make me proud and pissed at the same time.
“If you come, you come to my office, and if something happens down there”—I point to the club floor over my shoulder—“you’ll be the first to know.”
“Why would I come to your office? I need to be at the bar where I can see what’s going on.”
“You just got the job as my new assistant,” I tell her, watching her frown while wondering what the fuck I’m doing. This chick is a distraction I do not need right now, or ever for that matter.
“I already have a job,” she says as her frown grows deeper.
“Well, quit. You’re here every night, Mags, and you don’t leave ‘til the club closes at one. I can tell by the bags under your eyes that you’re exhausted.”
“Why would you want me to work here?” Now, isn’t that the million dollar question?
“Either take me up on my offer, or I’m going to have a restraining order placed against you and you won’t be allowed within a few hundred feet of the club.” I shrug like it’s all the same to me.
“You know this is malarkey, right?” she stands and I take her in fully for the first time tonight. Her loose, sheer, black dress is cinched with a thin belt emphasizing the dip in her waist between her full hips and breasts. Her hair is down in a mass of messy waves, and her makeup is subtle but still draws attention to her eyes, which look even more golden now that she’s standing in front of me looking pissed off.
“I’m not messing around with you anymore either. You take me up on my deal, or I’ll call the police and have them escort you off the premises,” I tell her, ignoring the fact I’m getting hard just looking at her.
“This is total crap,” she mumbles, looking around before meeting my eyes again.
“Take it or leave it.”
“Jeez, can I have a second to think?” she cries, and I feel my lips twitch, so I rub my hand down over my mouth to hide it.
“Ten,” I state, watching her eyes narrow. “Nine…eight…seven…” I continue counting, watching as she looks at me like she’s ready to kill me. “Six,” I raise a brow. “Five…”
“Fine!” she yells when I open my mouth to finish my countdown.
“Thought so,” I say triumphantly.
“You’re such a…you’re such a bigasterd,” she growls.
“A what?” I ask, and I can’t help it, I laugh at that one.
“When do I start?” she asks, ignoring my question while red spreads across her cheeks and down her neck.
“Tomorrow. Be here at five, and I’ll show you around the club and tell you your responsibilities.”
{ review } .
This is one of those books that I have a hard time rating -- do I go with gut and feeling? Or do I go with the little things that irked me throughout, off of style..? In the end, I went middle of the road. If I were rating off of style, though, a 4.5-star would certainly be too high, but rating on the fact that this book gripped me, pulled me under, and didn't let me back up until the end... Well, it's almost a 5-star then.
Immediately, we readers are thrown into a world with a young Sven. His fear, his terror of his mother is palpable through the page. The prologue is incredibly gripping. From there, we open the first chapter with Sven in a very dominant role with a woman in his office above the club he runs. My first thought while reading him being rough and tossing her out, his cockiness extremely evident? Psychologically, this makes sense. Right off the bat, I had a great feeling about this story simply off of the characterization of Sven and how he aged from that ten year old in the prologue.
However, for me personally, his characterization took a severe right turn from there.
Upon meeting Maggie, he has his cold and indifferent ways initially, but he finds himself drawn to this spitfire of a woman -- and her crazy insults (I seriously lol'd when she really let it loose, and called him anything and everything she could spew out of her mouth). He doesn't want her and her questions at his club, but when it's evident she's not leaving, he hires her -- and again, as we see the first time we meet Maggie, her strength shows. It is more than apparent just what a strong character she's going to be.
After those initial scenes though, I found Sven to no longer be the cruel man, but rather a very sweet, protective, slightly possessive, alpha male, and while I liked him even more during those times, I felt that it was too far off key from the initial characterization we were presented with. Without him telling his story to Maggie, that part of his past would have been easily forgotten, as a reader, due to the change in him. Don't get me wrong, Sven was still demanding, but it was on a whole different level than the initial. Also, I would have liked to see more Sven point of views. As it was, I felt even more in the dark than Maggie was throughout the story. I kept expecting to go into the next chapter and having it in Sven's point of view, simply in hopes to clarify something or to understand a look he gives, but it continued on in Maggie's voice. So this drew the question: is there overlap with the other books? I wouldn't think so, as Kai and Kenton are plenty settled at this point... Are we meant to be kept in the dark as readers? If so, why are we privvy to some information, but not others? At times, it would feel as if we (collective readers) were dropped in the middle of a scene.
This story takes place over a solid amount of time and with it, there are time jumps. Some of these jumps weren't very in-your-face, they felt out of place perhaps, but for the most part, these jumps in time allowed for the story to progress further. However, there were times that these jumps left me a little confused. Now -- I would like to clarify that I haven't read the previous two Underground Kings stories, so maybe some of these questions would have been clearer had I read them, but there's an early conversation with Justin referencing Maggie that had me going back to see if Sven had even talked to Justin yet. Additionally (and this one I know would be clear if I read the others) the suspense line of the story, while dealing with Maggie and her sister, deals with a man this group of men has been after for quite some time -- and with all the secret conversations the men are having, it felt as if the suspense aspect of the story wasn't fully embarked upon (it did have it's high moments, though).
I absolutely love that this was connected to ARR's Until series -- namely Until November. While I haven't read all of the Until books, I'm very much the type of reader that loves watching series weave in and out of one another -- it makes the author's mind a much more interesting place.
So. Confusion aside, I found myself incredibly engrossed in this story, and truly enjoyed Sven and his Mags ("It's Maggie, not Mags..." -- jealous much, friend?). I truly did not want it to end
I am excited to read Justin and Aubrey's story, Infatuation. I loved watching him talk about her and talking about her recent past, the love and protectiveness he has for her is incredibly evident. I can't wait to 'go back' and watch their story completely play out.
Immediately, we readers are thrown into a world with a young Sven. His fear, his terror of his mother is palpable through the page. The prologue is incredibly gripping. From there, we open the first chapter with Sven in a very dominant role with a woman in his office above the club he runs. My first thought while reading him being rough and tossing her out, his cockiness extremely evident? Psychologically, this makes sense. Right off the bat, I had a great feeling about this story simply off of the characterization of Sven and how he aged from that ten year old in the prologue.
However, for me personally, his characterization took a severe right turn from there.
Upon meeting Maggie, he has his cold and indifferent ways initially, but he finds himself drawn to this spitfire of a woman -- and her crazy insults (I seriously lol'd when she really let it loose, and called him anything and everything she could spew out of her mouth). He doesn't want her and her questions at his club, but when it's evident she's not leaving, he hires her -- and again, as we see the first time we meet Maggie, her strength shows. It is more than apparent just what a strong character she's going to be.
After those initial scenes though, I found Sven to no longer be the cruel man, but rather a very sweet, protective, slightly possessive, alpha male, and while I liked him even more during those times, I felt that it was too far off key from the initial characterization we were presented with. Without him telling his story to Maggie, that part of his past would have been easily forgotten, as a reader, due to the change in him. Don't get me wrong, Sven was still demanding, but it was on a whole different level than the initial. Also, I would have liked to see more Sven point of views. As it was, I felt even more in the dark than Maggie was throughout the story. I kept expecting to go into the next chapter and having it in Sven's point of view, simply in hopes to clarify something or to understand a look he gives, but it continued on in Maggie's voice. So this drew the question: is there overlap with the other books? I wouldn't think so, as Kai and Kenton are plenty settled at this point... Are we meant to be kept in the dark as readers? If so, why are we privvy to some information, but not others? At times, it would feel as if we (collective readers) were dropped in the middle of a scene.
This story takes place over a solid amount of time and with it, there are time jumps. Some of these jumps weren't very in-your-face, they felt out of place perhaps, but for the most part, these jumps in time allowed for the story to progress further. However, there were times that these jumps left me a little confused. Now -- I would like to clarify that I haven't read the previous two Underground Kings stories, so maybe some of these questions would have been clearer had I read them, but there's an early conversation with Justin referencing Maggie that had me going back to see if Sven had even talked to Justin yet. Additionally (and this one I know would be clear if I read the others) the suspense line of the story, while dealing with Maggie and her sister, deals with a man this group of men has been after for quite some time -- and with all the secret conversations the men are having, it felt as if the suspense aspect of the story wasn't fully embarked upon (it did have it's high moments, though).
I absolutely love that this was connected to ARR's Until series -- namely Until November. While I haven't read all of the Until books, I'm very much the type of reader that loves watching series weave in and out of one another -- it makes the author's mind a much more interesting place.
So. Confusion aside, I found myself incredibly engrossed in this story, and truly enjoyed Sven and his Mags ("It's Maggie, not Mags..." -- jealous much, friend?). I truly did not want it to end
I am excited to read Justin and Aubrey's story, Infatuation. I loved watching him talk about her and talking about her recent past, the love and protectiveness he has for her is incredibly evident. I can't wait to 'go back' and watch their story completely play out.
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