Reviewed by Dan
TITLE: No Matter What
SERIES: Sex & Mayhem (Book 4)
AUTHOR: K.A. Merikan
PUBLISHER: Acerbi & Villani Ltd.
LENGTH: 307 Pages
BLURB:
— A gentle heart has no place in an outlaw’s chest —
Ghost. Not a member of the Coffin Nails MC. Not a doctor anymore. Not gay.
Luca. Bent, not broken. Will not let go of Ghost. No matter what.
Ghost finds out the hard way that people you meet online aren’t always who they seem to be. When he met ‘Zara’ five years ago, they became inseparable. She’s been with him through the rough and the smooth. He’s been there for her when her abusive boyfriend had her in tears.
She is The One, and despite all his friends considering him crazy, Ghost is about to propose.
But ‘Zara’ turns out to be Luca, and Luca is most definitely a guy. Yet Luca is the same person with big dark eyes, so desperate to be saved that Ghost can’t help but fall head first.
Luca’s so-called boyfriend is not just abusive. He is a Sicilian drug lord, a man dangerous and ruthless. If Ghost is to ever save the person who wreaked havoc on his heart, he has to make a deal with the Coffin Nails MC. But being a member is a destiny he’s always tried to avoid. And when a life of violence becomes too much to bear, he might be the one needing Luca to catch him when he falls.
REVIEW:
I keep hoping someone will kill Frederico Villani, but it hasn’t happened yet, damn it!
I really, really enjoyed this book. I’m a huge fan of the sisters writing as K.A. Merikan and I’m pretty sure I’ve loved every one of their books so far. I did not read or review book three in this current series because it had a M/F storyline. I’m sure that if any of you who enjoy a M/F storyline give it a try that it will be as good as the rest.
However, I digress. I was speaking about this current book. We start the story just outside New York in a small Asian restaurant. Ghost, a member of the Coffin Nails MC, is at the restaurant to meet someone. Ghost lost his medical license as a result of helping save the son of the Coffin Nails President after he fell afoul of organ harvesters. Since then he has been staying at his parent’s house, playing an online game and chatting with a girl named Zara who is in a really bad relationship in Italy.
Ghost walks into the restaurant, and within minutes discovers that Zara is actually a young man named Luca! Ghost had been prepared to ask Zara to marry him….but Luca??
In a spectacularly bad move, Ghost and a couple other members of the Coffin Nails kidnap Luca from the men who have him. They shoot the tires out of the limo and leave the two men when they fly off on their motorcycles with Luca.
Remember that I said someone should kill Frederico Villani? Well guess who the guy is that has been holding Luca? That’s right Frederico. As any of us who read the stories of the Villani Family know, Frederico is a nasty piece of work. His chosen sex partners are young boys and he gets rid of them when he is through with them (or when they get too old for him). He has been planning to pass off Luca to his hired muscle, but not quite yet.
When Frederico catches up with them back at the Coffin Nails clubhouse, they find out who he is. The Coffin Nails have a working relationship with the Villani Family, so they make a deal, and money changes hands to “buy” Luca. In one final act of spite, Frederico cuts off one of Luca’s fingers to punish him for meeting Ghost. Of course he gives Ghost a “rebate” for the missing finger! Remember that rebate amount, it will be important later in the book.
As part of the deal, Ghost has to become a Prospect for the Coffin Nails MC, something he has never wanted since his dad has been a member for 40+ years and Ghost doesn’t want that life.
As Ghost settles in to his roll as a Prospect, Luca settles in to try to help out in whatever ways he can. But all hell will break loose before long. The story just gets better and better. We have rival MC’s coming to battle. We have Ghost figuring out that he might be interested in having sex with Luca! We have another kidnapping. We have another gay member of the MC who has something the size of an eggplant in his pants actively pursuing Luca. We have violence. And finally we have murders. All part of life at the Coffin Nails MC!
I very highly recommend this book, and this series. As always for these ladies, the book is flawlessly written and edited. You will not be sorry if you give it a shot. If you like books about motorcycle clubs, while at the same time having a gay storyline, it will be for you. It can be read as a standalone, but I would recommend going back and reading the others at some point as well!
RATING:
BUY LINKS:
I was ready to give this book a pass because I thought it sounded ridiculous and I had enough of motorcycle clubs after watching one season of Sons of Anarchy. Your review made me reconsider. Why do you do this to me? I have so many other books to read and a Master thesis to write. But now I am really curious.
Do not pass on this book/series. Go to “go” and collect, you will not be disappointed, the Merikan’s are fast becoming my favourite authors of 2015. I haven’t read this one yet (it’s my next read) purely because I’m reading another one of their books, I haven’t yet been disappointed.
llesarlorraine, did you read the Guns N Boys books? I absolutely LOVED that series.
Oh boy, did I! It was a reading marathon for me, can’t wait for the next book.
I’m sorry Carmen! What can I say, I love the sister’s books. And if you gave up on SOA after one season, you missed 6 really great seasons! 😉 Best of luck with the Thesis!
I absolutely love the Sex and Mayhem series and the Guns n’ Boys series. I’ve added the Merikans to my list of favorite authors. I really enjoyed Ghost’s story. I was also a fan of SOA. Watched every episode. 🙂
Me too! But not sure I liked that ending on SOA! I try not to miss anything by the Merikan sisters, although I did skip Book Three in this series, which they wrote as Miss Merikan instead of K.A. Merikan. As a gay guy, girly bits frighten me! 😉
Don’t tell them, but I also skipped book 3!