In their race for the truth, love must prove more powerful than America’s worst enemy… When a gorgeous, bleeding woman on the run falls into the arms of Sean “Metal” O’Brien, the former SEAL medic knows just what he can do. Heal her. Tend to her. Keep her safe. What he can’t seem to do is keep his guard up. Something about the haunted, hunted beauty knocks down all his defenses. Felicity … defenses.
Felicity Ward is no stranger to secrets. Raised in the Witness Protection Program, her whole childhood was a lie. But she couldn’t have known that her family’s secrets–secrets she didn’t even know she was keeping–could spark a nuclear war.
And nothing could have prepared her for the tough, sexy warrior who first saves her life and then vows to protect it, no matter what.
This book is approximately 75,000 words
One-click with confidence. This title is part of the Carina Press Romance Promise: all the romance you’re looking for with an HEA/HFN. It’s a promise!
Originally published in 2015
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I liked Felicity in Midnight Vengeance and her meet-cute with Metal was intriguing so I dove right away into this book. After reading it, though, my feelings are a bit mitigated. I liked Metal a lot, more than I expected from his brief appearance in the previous book. His background story is so full of loss and hurt that, the more I read about him, the more I wanted to know him. Sadly, the book doesn’t have enough pages to explore all the facets of this fascinating character and stays pretty much on the surface all along.
Felicity was a lot better in the previous book. There, she sounded like a fun, quirky nerdy girl, introverted and, of course, in a lot of trouble. But here… she became the generic out-of-this-world beautiful damsel in distress with a zest of your average computer whiz.
Her background story and the villain’s reasons for wanting to hurt her are highly unlikely and hard to believe. Too many plot holes and unnecessarily complex motivations made the villain more laughable than threatening.
Lastly, the thing that made me take off one star for how bad it was, is Jacko’s behavior toward Felicity. The whole “You brought danger to my woman’s doorstep” is ridiculous at best, rude and insensitive in any case. What kind of a douchebag blames and guilt trips the victim of a vicious attack for asking help from the only person she knows in town?!? So so wrong!
Luckily, Metal was there for Felicity, but still. It rubbed me the wrong way.
I loved this series and all the characters. Her writing brings them all to life and the stories are exciting.
Great Heroine, Shallow Hero
Felicity was amazing – brilliant and tenacious. Metal kept musing on how someone as beautiful as Felicity shouldn’t be in such a dangerous situation. He did it so much I couldn’t help but wonder if a less attractive woman would be out of luck where he was concerned. It seemed incongruous with the fact that he was a doctor who came from a long line of family who believed in lending a hand. Also, the overuse of the word “Honey” and “is that okay with you?” seemed condescending.
Love this series
Because Rice has just released another in the Midnight series – get this book while it’s on sale!
I judge my books by the number of underline moments it has. Rice’s writing is witty and draws the characters sharply. Felicity is a “God, where was the Tardis when she needed it?” character. A nerd I loved, she could rescue herself. That’s another thing I love about Rice’s novels – her female leads have agency. Sometimes they can’t save themselves physically, but they sure as heck contribute.
What I especially love about Rice’s writing is that it is grounded in research in tech – both military and civilian. This book “predicted” the ubiquity of facial recognition AI among other technologies.
Promises gives us two smart characters fleshed out with fabulous dialogue and believable action. Fun read!