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Ana Cordona has been a strong leader for the lupine shifters who survived after all the males and most of the females in her pack were mysteriously poisoned. As tough as she is, with no Alpha male, the pack is vulnerable to the devious shifter Taggart, who wants to claim both their ranch and Ana as his own. When Connor Armstrong comes back into her life, promising protection, it’s almost enough to make Ana forget how he walked out on her before—and reluctantly accept his offer to mate.
The minute Connor sees Ana again, it reawakens a raw hunger. He must have her for his bondmate—his wolf cries out for it. But his human side knows he must proceed with caution because of their complicated past. If he is to truly have her body and soul, he must go beyond his burning desire and win back her heart. Whatever it takes, he is determined not to leave her side again.
But Taggart and his rival pack are not their only enemies. A human element in town is targeting shifters. Their plan not only threatens Ana and Connor’s future, but the lives of the entire pack…
While I had a couple of qualms in regards to frequently repeated phrases (Reus really liked to bring up how badass the Council's Enforcer is) or concepts (I understand that Ana wouldn't be considered a true Alpha, it doesn't need saying every time she talks about the difference between herself and Connor) overall I really enjoyed the first book in her new series. The issues I had with her shorter story, DESTINED MATE, were pretty much answered and fixed in this longer book in fact (they are not set in the same universe).
What I liked a lot about it was that while its clearly the first book, and thus has a lot of character introducing and history telling and such, Reus snuck in several side stories that would make for great novels on their own, or work as secondary plots for future books/stories. I counted no less than 4 plots that could easily be made into their own novels, with at least two others that I wouldn't mind reading about either. Yes I did just ambitiously hope for another 6 books in this series (at the very least), but I really liked these Cordona women and the Armstrong pack.
Despite some repetition, Reus conveys a lot of story and world information in this novel. As I said she puts forth not only Ana/Connor's story, but lays the groundwork for a few other stories (including the next book PRIMAL POSSESSION, which is about Connor's brother Liam and his rather problematic mate). Each character was given a personality; though Ana and Connor got a lot of the attention, I felt as if I knew Liam, Ryan, Teresa, Carmen and all the others just as well. Even the bad guys (of which there was three elements competing for who can be the worst evil) were rounded out well enough that they're motivations were all obviously different.
I do question the fact that there was three separate, but equally important to the storyline, elements of bad. A rival pack, the cause behind the Cordona pack's illness and then a third element of bigoted jerkwads who just want the complete genocide of all things supernatural. The vying components muddled the story instead of, as I suspect Reus meant, playing red herring to each other. While it did go a fairly good job of covering who was the one who poisoned the Cordonas at first, by about halfway through it ceased to matter because everyone outside of the Cordona-Armstrong Pack seemed to want them dead.
And that I think is why I didn't devour this as quickly as I should have. The constant POV-shifting (not just Connor and Ana, but also Liam, Liam's mate, Bad Guy 1, Bad Guy 2, Bad Guy 3, Bad Guy connected to Bad Guy 2, a couple other members of the pack...) began to grate on my nerves. While the characters themselves were individual, their goals began to bleed into one and other. Some events would be seen from several different viewpoints, but reveal very little new information.
Overall I greatly enjoyed this book because Ana and Connor are both strong characters. They were the true highlight, even with some obvious misunderstandings, their relationship came across so genuine and warm that I just wanted them to snuggle together. The secondary characters were also a strong draw, so much so when tragedy struck I felt the pain and misery they all must have felt. Hopefully the next books focus less on outside POV's and more on the core characters.
