Ames’ review of Locked and Loaded by Samantha Cayto.
Former army-turned-ER doctor Grace McKinnon is through with going to bed with nothing more than fantasies and a yearning to resurrect her personal life. She’s determined instead to take the Cougar Challenge with a flesh and hot-blooded younger man. She discovers the perfect opportunity steaming up the curtain of exam room four.
Captain Mark Bennington has been locked and loaded—ready for action—since meeting Grace. He’s on a mission to heat up the Boston nights while on leave. This sexy older woman is lighting his way, fulfilling double-time every sex wish he’s ever made. But it’s going to be the toughest fight of his life to convince her to take a chance on more than just a fling.
Before I start my review I just want to say: That is a horrible cover and it definitely will not attract people to this novella, which was actually very good. Ok, now onto my review…
This ebook packed quite the unexpected emotional punch. Yeah it had some hot loving, but the story behind these two characters was really interesting!
Grace is an ER doctor in her early forties. I’m usually not one for older women/younger man romances because the woman usually feels such guilt over the younger man that it gets on my nerves. Grace didn’t get on my nerves. Mark didn’t give Grace a chance to get on my nerves. LOL
And Mark. Here is a man, in the military, who is sick of the casual hook ups and wants something that lasts longer than one night but that has a definite end date. He sees Grace and goes after her, recognizing that she’d be mature enough to handle a short-term affair. She wouldn’t be into playing games. And he was right.
However, neither of them expected to begin falling for the other.
Now the romance in this novella was all well and good (and super hot) but what got me was the secondary plot revolving around Mark’s friend who is suffering big time from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Now that really got my emotions involved and I was surprised that this novella packed such a weighty issue into the word count and it did and it worked.
So if you’re in the mood for a hot novella that is a little bit deeper than other offerings at Ellora’s Cave, definitely pick this one up. Locked and Loaded gets a 4 out of 5 from me!
This book is available from Ellora’s Cave. You can buy it here in e-format.
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