Passion, desire, and intrigue oh my!

The next story in London’s Sweetblood series entices, excites, and leads reader’s right into the mind of the traitor turned informant, Alfonso Serrano.

Alfonso has paid for centuries for his once rebellious, bad boy nature. First at the hands of the Overlord, leader of a blood thirsty, anti-human movement The Alliance, and again by binding himself to the vampire Guardians as a double agent seeking to bring the Overlord down. Now that Alfonso has done just that he wants a quiet existence, but killing the Overlord has a price. A price that involves an Alliance assassin that will do whatever it takes to see Alfonso, and anyone connected with him tortured and annihilated in the most brutal fashion.

Lily DeGraff never wanted love from any man, except her father. Her focus was always on her tracking career, until she was assigned as a contact to double agent Alfonso. Ten years later Alfonso is more than just a contact but a lover who spurned her and far too late, since her feelings were already engaged. Lily is used to the idea of being without Alfonso, but when the Overlord’s remaining peon’s target her for recruitment Alfonso barges in to rescue her. The heat levels rise and lovers reunite, as Alfonso and Lily must thwart the assassin and other obstacles to stay alive.

What I loved about this book was that both hero and heroine are vampires. There is no protecting the poor human who the vampire falls in love with. This is all about past relationships, actions, and the repercussions of Alfonso choices. When it comes to Lily his choices range from protection to mind blowing passion, and finally love. One of my favorite scenes is when Lily and Alfonso are trying to navigate their way through a hotspot club for The Alliance:

She started to whisper to Alfonso when voices boomed out from the other side of the door. The handle twisted and the sign dangled back and forth.

In a flash, her back slammed against the opposite wall and Alfonso covered her body with his. She gasped, and his lips came down over hers, capturing the sound in his mouth.

For a split second, she was completely shocked again, all her senses overpowered by him. But then she realized it was all for show, just like at the bar. They didn’t belong in this section of the club and Alfonso was just playing a part.

And so could she.

The kind of passion Lily and Alfonso experience makes for a great read.  It doesn’t get any better than two desirable vampires trying their best to avoid re-kindling the relationship, for completely opposite reasons. Alfonso is geared toward protection and inner conflict, does he really deserve happiness? Lily has already been down the tough love road too often, and not surprisingly has difficulty in understanding Alfonso’s motivations.

Not only was I captivated by the main characters and their story, but the fact that this story gave me a chance to become better acquainted with my favorite characters from the first book, Bonded By Blood, including Alfonso’s tasty brother Dominic and the insatiable sex maniac Jackson. Overall, it’s a great story, and definitely had me turning pages late into the night.

~ Landra