Crossroads

Back in New Orleans... with Nicole (Nick) Peyton and Derek Gabriel.

New Orleans...Peyton.... yeah, somebody's riding my nerves.

Two years ago, Derek was changed into a wolf by a rogue. Nicole was born one. A pureblood, she is the daughter of the Alpha, an alpha very much against mixing blood with the changed.

Everyone, and I mean everyone, seems to have some starcrossed love story thing going on. Kat (seer, and Derek's cousin) has a crush on Andrew (Derek's business partner). Or as Nick tells it, 'They have this thing. It's epic.'

LoL

And then... Nick's sister Michelle is in love with Aaron, her bodyguard. But Michelle is a shapeshifting seer, so she's not alowed emotional or physical ties. Nothing that will divide her loyalties. And damn it, I like Aaron. That boy is 100% whipped. Attentive, giving, and obedient.

Anyway, because of Derek's change and the animalistic instincts projected onto his humanity, he doesn't trust himself with Nick. Why he's afraid he'll hurt a fullblood werewolf, I will never come to terms with.

So when things finally start to go from screwey to making sense, Michelle shows up with Aaron. And she's pregnant. Aaron's execution has been ordered and they'll likely kill Michelle, too. Once again, the band is pulled together, and even Jackson's mother is in town.

Nothing prepared me for the events following page 200. First, this dawning moment where everything was eclipsed by a feeling of how the story would end. Aaron tells Nicky he's going to die, that he won't make it through this, and he's been prepared for it since he fell in love with Michelle. So suddenly I know, I just KNOW, who has to die for Aaron to live. And that possibility hurt too.

As Luke (son of a bitch, literally, who wants her son to be the next alpha and therefore wants Luke to marry Nick) and Derek sit alone sipping a beer, realizing neither of them will ever be able to be with the women they love... my heart plummetted. I had to put down the book, I was so shattered.

Page 233, as I calculated anyway, ripped at my breaking heart.

As did every other page after that.

Until.. Derek earns Coleman's seat on the Conclave, which he declines. Hoffman responds...

"You have to want it. Why the hell else would you have risked this fight?"

and Derek answers,

"Because my Xbox broke and there wasn't anything good on TV."

HELL YEAH!

So another book.. another bullet... another casualty.

It ain't right. For everything to go so wrong and yet end up kinda right.

Everybody got the girl. Maybe not for forever. Maybe not the way they wanted.

But this one was sooooo much better than the first. It wasn't a fanatic they were up against but pure, simple archaic politics. Everyone had some part of their life on the line. And everyone had their world altered in some way.

Nick left her bar. I wonder who's gonna run it now... I love that place...

Looking forward to book three, DEADLOCK, 2011, as it tells Alec's chapter.

Carmen Mendoza's shapeshifter father abandoned her. Raised by her psychic mother, Carmen ignored her paternal family's political machinations--until the day they decided to use her in their bid for power. Trapped between two worlds and snared by a vicious spell meant to wake her inner wolf, Carmen's only hope is to trust the one man strong enough to soothe her darkest instincts.

Born a pureblood wolf, Alec Jacobson lives as a rebel, the black sheep alpha who protects the supernatural residents of New Orleans from wolf politics. Too bad he can't protect himself from his need for Carmen. Staking a claim on his enemy's niece will turn his city into a battleground, unless he can find a way to stop breaking the rules--and start making them.