Rowena’s review of Let Me In by Callie Croix.
Hero: Liam Brodie
Heroine: Talia Barnett
On leave for Thanksgiving, the last thing marine lieutenant Talia Barnett expects to find is Liam Brodie waiting for her at the airport. He’s had a starring role in her fantasies for the past two years, and although she’d love to make them a reality, she has a dark secret that prevents her from taking things further.
A former marine, Liam’s specialty is planning tactical operations, and that’s just what he plans to do to win Talia. The woman has kept him at arm’s length for too long, and this time he’s finally going to claim her—body and heart.
What begins as comfort quickly turns hot. When Liam shows Talia a hint of the dominant nature inside him, the submissive part of her flares to life. Though she desires him, she’s going back on deployment and doesn’t want to dump all her drama on him. Will he find a way to break through the protective walls around her heart and convince her they have a future that goes far beyond the bedroom?
This book founds its way onto my TBR pile when I started making my lists of books to read for the Digital First Read-a-Thon. I’d never heard of this author before preparing for the DFRAT but I’m so glad that she came onto my radar because I enjoyed Liam and Talia’s story.
This story follows Liam Brodie as he sets out to get the girl he’s been wanting for quite some time. Talia Bennett has been a friend to his sister’s for about two years and he wants to get closer than she’s letting him. Talia’s family life isn’t the great big ball of happiness that Liam shares with his family and she really doesn’t want to dump all of her family drama on them so she doesn’t talk about her family life. She’s got a depressed Mom that can be quite the handful and she’s a huge reason why Talia isn’t big on family, even though she loves the Brodie family. Being in the marine corps gives her an excuse to be deployed during the holidays but this Thanksgiving, things change.
What I enjoyed about this story was even though it’s such a short story, there’s a surprising amount of depth to the story, to the characters and I really dug that about this one. Talia’s character is reserved and she keeps people at a distance because it’s what she’s always done. I really liked Talia’s character and I liked what Croix did with her character. There have been stories that I’ve read where heroines just like Talia got on my hot damn nerves and I wanted to smack the crap out of them but that wasn’t the case with Talia at all. With Talia, I wanted to be her best friend and include her in my own family.
Liam is a total dreamboat. He’s a total alpha manly man who knows what he wants and isn’t going to give up on her until he gets what he wants. I could totally tell why Talia was in love with him and when she thought she didn’t deserve him, I wanted to weep for her. And because of that, I loved Liam all the more because he didn’t give up on her. He just kept right on going until she surrendered to him and when she did, I cheered. I think Liam and his family were just what Talia needed and seeing them get their happy ending was good.
I recommend this book to fans of contemporary romances with military characters. This was a good one. I’m glad that I read it and I will definitely be on the look out for more by this author.
Grade: 4.5 out of 5
This book is available from Carina Press. You can buy it here in e-format.
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