Reviewed by Anna Lynn

TITLE:  Above and Beyond

SERIES:  Twist of Fate #4

AUTHOR:  Lucy Lennox & Sloane Kennedy

PUBLISHER:  Self-Published

LENGTH:  358 pages

RELEASE DATE:  January 20, 2020

BLURB:

Lucky

Two years ago I humiliated myself by declaring my love to an older man who clearly didn’t share my feelings. And that’s fine. One day Zach will come around. Meanwhile, I’ve built a life for myself in northern Montana, pursuing my college degree while working hard toward certification in high-risk alpine search and rescue on the side. And perhaps I’ve kept the danger part a secret from my two dads. After all, what they don’t know won’t hurt them…

Everything’s going exactly as planned until my dads send Zach to check on me just as I’m dealing with an ex who doesn’t understand the meaning of the word no. It’s bad enough Zach still thinks of me as a child; now he also thinks I’m incapable of looking out for myself. I need to get him off my back before he finds out I’m not heading to Wyoming for summer break like everyone thinks. I’m going to Glacier National Park to learn how to rappel from helicopters…

Zach

Two years ago I wanted something I couldn’t have, so I threw myself back into my job as an Army Ranger and wound up scarred in more ways than one. When the army dumps my sorry self back into the real world, it’s time to start over. I accept a summer job teaching high-risk search and rescue. On the way there, all I have to do is peek in on little Lucky Reed and make sure he’s okay.

He’s not. Someone has it out for him, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let him get hurt on my watch. My plan is to keep him safe until he heads south for his summer job playing trail guide to tourists. Once he’s gone, I’ll be free to head to Glacier where my biggest challenge will be keeping a handful of alpine search and rescue students safe as they learn how to dangle from helicopters high above the Rocky Mountains.

It’s all fine. Until it’s not. Danger follows us to Glacier, and by the time I finally start seeing Lucky as more than the awkward teenager he used to be, I wonder if it’s too late to convince him that this scarred soldier sees him as anything but little anymore.

REVIEW:

There are different kinds of abuses involving control and neglect. Abuses can be physical, emotional, and/or mental/psychological. Control can be in the form of using one’s position of power to control a lower ranked personnel or subordinate. Neglect can be in the form of indifference, or outright disregard of another person. But all these have the same effect, it can result in low self-esteem, no self-confidence, feeling worthless, and that feeling of not being someone/anyone without that other person.

Lucky, just like his name, has been very lucky in that he has two really great adoptive parents who accepts him for who he is! He hadn’t had a good life before he was adopted. His mother, her long string of boyfriends and her pimp were neglectful of him and showed him a bad example of living. Prostitution and drug addiction was what surrounded him since he was a child. He got another chance at life when they threw him out. He met Bennett and then he got adopted by Bennett and Xander. And now he is on his way to achieving his dreams.

Zach found his long lost brother after searching for him for so long. In finding his brother, he also found his brother’s new family who consist of men and a few women who have become integral to his brother’s life in the small town of Haven, Colorado. What his brother, his family, and friends didn’t know was that he was in a controlled relationship the day he started his basic training. He got out of it due to the abuse that he got from his then partner, who was his superior in the military. He vowed to never control someone if ever he is in a relationship which he doesn’t plan on having. He is too afraid of becoming what he detested.

Lucky has had a crush on Zach since he met him when he was in his teens. It turned into love which he declared to Zach when he turned eighteen, but the older man rejected him. That was two years ago.

Lucky wanted to do Alpine Search and Rescue, but he still plans to finish his college degree. He has kept his training a secret from his parents. But when Zach checks on him on campus and eventually meets him again in the advanced course he plans to take up for the summer, he has to confessed that it is what he wants to do for a career.

Zach has been staying away from his family, again, after they found his older brother, Jake. He has secrets that he vowed to never let them know.  These are also some of the reasons why he is reluctant to give in to his attraction to Lucky, aside from the difference in age.  But as luck would have it, Lucky is the “A” student that his boss and friend Tag had been raving about who would one day be an aced SAR operative. They have to work together in order for Lucky to finish his advanced course.

The hot-and-cold interaction between them eventually led to Lucky realizing that he can either take what Zach can only give him and be happy with it or just not start anything at all. He decided to take what he can get, but if Zach has rules, he will also have some.

A long-time-coming love story that will break your heart and bring you up and down on a rollercoaster of emotions, this story has the signature styles of both Ms. Lucy Lennox and Ms. Sloane Kennedy. We have the high angst factor, the smart and funny banter, the thrill, action, mystery, and a love story that is so swoon worthy that it will make your heart palpitate nonstop. And let me just say that the waiting was totally worth it! Lucky and Zach are two characters in this series who were assumed to be harboring some deep emotions through the experiences they’ve had in their pasts and learning about them finally has put our hearts and souls through to the breaking point. A heartfelt gratitude to both amazing writers for being able to put all these factors into Lucky and Zach’s soulmate-worthy tale of love!

RATING:

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