Liam Lansing is heir to a prominent family of bio-modified vampires. That is, until he chooses the wrong lover and is cast down to the Gutter to scrape for his life.
Daniel Harding is heir to Cybernetix and a prince of the corporate Sky. That is, until his ideology drives his father to put a price on his head, forcing him into the Gutter.
But Daniel and Liam won’t vanish meekly into the smog. Together, they plan to rip open the hidden corruption that runs the Sky—for vengeance, for justice, and for hope. They strike against the corporations in a daring raid. When everything goes wrong, Daniel must betray his core beliefs to save the man he loves and protect his dangerous secret. Only through courage in the face of death—or worse—might he and Liam change the world they live in and create something new under the sun.
We first meet Daniel and Liam in the previous book, Chip in His Shoulder, and that meeting was both stressful, deadly and a renewal of a relationship that they both thought was long over.
Daniel is a man fighting against the technological modifications (mods) that society has gotten so entrenched in. He feels that the companies who are producing these products – his father’s company included and at the top of the list – are fleecing and taking advantage of the public. Liam is a man who used to live in luxury in the Sky but his family had spurned him and he’d ended up in the gutter. Now Liam and Daniel are together again, and their out to get Daniel’s father and his company and end their reign of mod terror.
Daniel and Liam set out originally to get into Daniel’s father’s building and steal some of the UV mod that will make it possible for vampires to walk in the sun. The company, Cybernetics, as well as a couple of others, keep telling the vampires that the mod is still in the research and development stage when in reality the product is complete. If they tell the vampires about it, however, all the millions of dollars that the vampires are putting into those companies will stop. When Daniel and Liam head to one of Daniel’s friends house they discover something else. Cybernetix has also created a mutation of the vampire mod that would make vampires lethally sensitive to any light in the spectrum. The men decide that the only way anyone will believe them about the dangerous mods is to have the products in hand. They plan to break in steal the products and then somehow get someone to listen to them.
Daniel and Liam get the products but something goes horribly wrong when it’s tested on Liam. In order to save Liam’s life Daniel actually gets mods himself and tries to save the man he loves while putting those he holds closest to his heart in danger. Daniel’s father isn’t a man to mess around with and he’ll do anything in his power to get what he wants.
It was so nice to read this longer story that is set in the Gutter and the Sky. I liked the first novella set in this world with Daniel and Liam but this book brought it all to a whole new level. We got to see deeper into both the mens’ lives and in Daniel’s case see what a true bastard his father was as well as another interesting twist. While the story was not focused on the romance between the two men the book definitely showed us a deepening of the men’s love for each other and proof of the lengths they would go to keep the other safe and by their side. The book was a great mix of love, family, sex, friendship, anger and resentment with a wonderful dose of action adventure right in the middle of it all. A really great book for those who enjoy a great mix of love, family, sex, friendship, an “other” world, anger and resentment with a wonderful dose of action adventure right in the middle of it all.
Rating: 4 out of 5
I read a xmas novella by Witt last month and adored it. Def want to start trying more of her stuff.
I've really liked her books so far. Her Changing Plans series is really good as is Rules of Engagement.