REVIEWED by Jen B.
TITLE: Suspicious Behavior
SERIES: Bad Behavior #2
AUTHORS: L.A. Witt and Cari Z
PUBLISHER: Riptide Publishing
LENGTH: 283 Pages
RELEASE DATE: August 21, 2017
BLURB: Detective Darren Corliss is hanging by a thread. In between recovering from a near-fatal wound and returning to work at a hostile precinct, he’s struggling to help care for his ailing brother. His partner and boyfriend, Detective Andreas Ruffner, wants to help, but doesn’t know how. And with his own family crises brewing, Andreas is spread almost as thin as Darren.
For cops, though, life takes a backseat to the job. When a stack of unsolved homicides drops into their laps, Andreas and Darren think they’re unrelated cold cases. But when a connection surfaces, they find themselves on the tail of a prolific serial killer who’s about to strike again.
Except they’ve got nothing. No leads. No suspects. Just a pile of circumstantial evidence and a whole lot of hunches. Time is running out to stop the next murder—and to pull themselves back from their breaking points.
The detectives are back and better than ever, or maybe not better, since they are going through some major trouble this time around. More so than before when they took down all those dirty cops. Now they are trying to work in the aftermath, and their little takedown has not made them any friends in the department, that’s for sure.
In this installment, they have picked up cold cases from the officer they helped put away, and they quickly realize there is a serial killer on the loose and they have limited time to figure it all out before he strikes again. It isn’t so much the mystery of whodunnit, as much as it is them trying to gather enough evidence to make it stick as the clock ticks down. As I already said, they have extra trouble with various roadblocks put up by law enforcement who care more about them failing than catching a killer. Luckily they still have a few friends they can count on, which is what saved them in the end.
But, these guys cannot get a break. They are still recovering from their last ordeal when Darren almost died. Andreas has to face issues with his status being leaked to his daughter, his other daughter’s mother is in some kind of trouble, and he is at a loss as to how to help Darren deal with the issue of his brother’s failing health and rapid decline due to early onset Alzheimer’s. On top of that, Darren is still worrying about whether or not he has the gene that will send him down the same road as his brother, and if he does, what that will mean for him and Andreas. Fear not though, these two have come out of all of this stronger than ever, and it is easy to see that Andreas is in it for the long haul, no matter what.
I love this action-packed series. Even though it was frustrating at times, just as it was for the guys, for them to keep struggling to obtain sufficient evidence, it was very realistic and no doubt common among those in the profession. There weren’t as many sexy scenes to get lost in, but what we get is more than enough to establish the level of emotion and caring these two have about each other. I really like how the family stuff has been playing out and can’t wait to see where it goes from here. Hopefully, these guys get the much needed break they’ve earned and some more alone time they’ve been craving. Definitely recommend this series!
