When she finds herself bound to a stranger’s bed, former cat burglar Cleo Moran knows she should’ve stayed in retirement. However, the thought of ending the cursed dreams that plague her sleeping hours was simply too enticing to resist. She also feels a strong sensual pull to her captor–but knows better than to act on it.
At first, Sasha Michaels wants only his captive’s professional expertise and contacts to track down the man who attacked his sister. Then Cleo wakes up and, with words and action, stirs something much more primitive within him. Neither understanding nor willing to accept her resistance, Sasha attempts to bind Cleo to him with sexual ties. Their tentative relationship, however, is jeopardized by secrets on both sides, and a common enemy who is escalating in violence.
This is certainly erotic romance and as a novella is very well written. The story does not seem to be too large for the format, which is a characteristic I find not uncommon in the shorter forms like short stories or novellas. But not only is the title dreamy, but the way in which the story is told is also dreamy–always with a sense that the characters are acting out a life drama encapsulated in the mist of fantasy. That sense is perpetrated by the plot–statues that have been taken from their original placement in an ancient archeological dig in South America–and now those that hold possession of those statues are being plagued by dreams and nightmares, almost in the form of a curse on the families and their individual members as long as those statues are not again placed in their original setting. It seems that something dark and ancient has been disturbed and the people involved continue to suffer. In the midst of all this is the attraction between Sasha and Cleo–an uneasy attraction at best, one that seems to be an on-again-off-again kind of connection. But with the sub-plot of Sasha’s sister’s rape and near murder, it is not unthinkable that all the “players” in this life drama are uneasy within themselves as well as with each other.
I have to own up to feeling that this was not an easy novella to read. It was full of pain and unease, searching for deeper and ancient truth, trying to find a love that seemed to allude Sasha and Cleo, and complicated by a psycho that kept inserting himself into these people’s lives. There were a number of dream sequences that I thought were written into the story with great skill, and still there were some instances when I didn’t feel that the scenarios of the story flowed from one to the other with the ease I needed to get the full impact of the story line. Probably just me, but I felt it was a bit disjointed. Having said that, I thought Ms Bruce maintained a strong sense of the “dark and dreamy” throughout the entire novella and I think that was in keeping with the nature of the plot. So there was much to recommend this novella to those who are drawn to the exploration of the ancient. The sexual encounters were definitely erotic and all in all, this was a very romantic read.
I give this novella a rating of 3.25 out of 5.
You can read more from Judith at Dr. J’s Book Place.
This book is available from Ellora’s Cave. You can buy it here in e-format.
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