Reviewed by Elizabetta

TITLE: Dirty Deeds

SERIES: Dirty Deeds, #1

AUTHOR: SE Jakes

PUBLISHER: Riptide Publishing

LENGTH: 82 pages

BLURB:

Two seasoned operatives finally meet their match: each other.

 

Cillian works for the mysterious Special Branch 20: an organization that runs black ops commissioned by the British government. His specialty is deep undercover assignments with virtually no support. He’s been alone for so long that he no longer knows anything else.

 

Mal’s also used to being alone. Wanted in several states and even more countries, he’s not allowed in the vicinity of any of his former Navy SEAL teammates. And his current assignment is to track Cillian in order to discover the spook’s endgame. Except he’s no longer sure which one of them is getting played.

 

Cillian isn’t about to let the mission that’s consumed him for the past several years crumble because an outsider is poking around where he doesn’t belong. But Mal forces his way through Cillian’s defenses—and into his heart—exposing a devastating betrayal that could destroy them both.

 

REVIEW:

 

I don’t get it. And apparently I’m in the minority. I tried, I really did.

 

Truthfully, I started this off not expecting to like it much. I really didn’t care for another book I’d recently read in this world, Catch a Ghost. Just ask my friend Ilhem, she had to listen to me whine through it. But… I was willing to give it another try with Dirty Deeds — sorry Jenn T for the continued whining.

 

In Ghost, I didn’t get Prophet and Tom (well, Tom I kinda liked, loved his tat anyway), but I thought Cillian and Mal had potential. So I was willing to give them a try. Dirty Deeds is their story, or, well, their interlude. ’Cause it’s a very short read. Consisting mostly of the author telling us why we should find these two so compelling. And there is problem numero uno, I again have issues with the writing style. Unfortunately, the guys also come off just as sophomoric as their peers.

 

After a lot of cyber spying on each other, Mal and Cillian’s real-world dalliance starts in an anonymous sex-up in a very dimly lit hookup bar. Up against a back wall, Mal takes Cillian in a typical thick-dick-reaming-tight-hole scene. Sort of the equivalent of the grade school punch on the shoulder which says, “Hey, I might like you.”

 

“Giving his body over to someone he didn’t know was always an exciting potential mistake, but the heightened pleasure gained from the risk was undeniable. God, it was good to feel, to know he was truly alive inside despite all the cloak-and-dagger secrecy of his job.”

 

Hot, right? But then it all goes back to IM hookups, to heavy digital flirting and dirty dick pics (the ultimate selfie!!). Sort of the equivalent of 21st century dating.

 

“… I think you should at least buy me dinner first, Cillian chided.

 

‘Too much work, Just show me your cock.”

 

[… ]

 

“I showed you my dick and you’re concerned about my name?… now you’ve insulted me”

 

“Somehow, I think it would take more than that. It’s a nice cock, though.”

 

“Nice? Fuck off.”

 

These guys are in their late twenties/mid thirties. They are undercover operatives in a very dangerous profession, chasing the bad guy who has been out-foxing them so far. After all this, I’m supposed to take them seriously?

 

There’s the promise of more hot RL sexing, the whole he-man demeanor screams it. Oh yeah, I’m so there. But this is such a tease. Cillian and Mal’s encounters are limited to online quipping. There’s lots of serious telling vs. showing me da monay. At 60% it’s more digital coitus. Digital slow-burn.

 

There is a plot: everyone is looking for traitor John Morse, who may or may not be dead. Informants are dropping like flies. There is an interesting twist in the plot (one star for that). But this all takes up a smaller percentage of the story outline. The build-up is all about these two guy’s connection in a big, bad world. This interlude is the set up for the next offering in this world, but I don’t think Cillian and Mal are served up well. The writing doesn’t sell them to me, and I’m thinking that herein lies my real issue.

 

If you love the other books and the other guys in this world, you’ll probably love this one. It’s wonderful how we all have different tastes and expectations. It’s what makes the world go ’round. This reader is hopping off the carrousel, though; I haven’t been convinced that this world is for me.

 

RATING:

 

BUY LINKS: Riptide