Reviewed by Sadonna
TITLE: Bitten by Desire
SERIES: Regent’s Park Pack
AUTHOR: Annabelle Jacobs
NARRATOR: Antony Ferguson
PUBLISHER: Tantor Audio
LENGTH: 8 hours and 8 minutes
RELEASE DATE: December 17, 2020
BLURB:
Two lovers from rival packs. Have they come together only to be forced apart?
Alec Knight, a beta in the Regent’s Park pack, guards his heart carefully. Ghosts from his past keep him alone and angry, any hope of a relationship impossible while guilt from the pack wars still haunts him. With the anniversary drawing near, Alec needs a distraction.
As a lowly member of the Primrose Hill pack, Mark Appleton isn’t used to having his alpha’s attention. Lately he’s had more than his fair share, and not for the right reasons. Despite growing suspicions that all is not well, Mark tries hard to do better, but constant criticism leaves him desperate for a stress outlet.
Sex is a good way for shifters to let off steam, and while their packs attack each other with accusations and lies, Alec and Mark work out their frustrations in bed. Pillow talk and shared secrets lead to a closeness neither was expecting, but when pack relations reach an all-time low, any future for them seems out of the question.
If they want to be together, they’ll have to go against their alphas’ wishes – except Alec won’t and Mark can’t.
Contains mature themes.
REVIEW:
Note: This is book 3 in the series and as such has major spoilers for books 1 and 2.
Mark Appleton is a young shifter of the Primrose Hill pack – which puts in somewhat of a conflict with the Regent’s Park pack as described in the first two books in this series. He’s still pretty new to his role in the pack and he’s not very high on the food chain. Post the skirmishes of the last two books, the Regent’s Park and Primrose Hill packs are back to being more adversarial after the Rogue pack has been mostly brought to heel. But Stephen Newell, the alpha of the P pack is still pretty pissed off that his little plan didn’t result in the death of the Regent’s Park pack that he had tried to engineer and he still wants revenge.
Unfortunately Alec was around for the pack wars and he’s not keen on having another one start. When there is yet another pretty underhanded scheme to set off another fight and Mark is at the center of it, Alec steps in. For some reason he’s attracted to Mark and he figures since the packs had been working together, then having a little fling with Mark will be a good way for him to distract himself from a painful anniversary. But what he doesn’t count on is having his feelings involved. He becomes pretty protective and Mark seems to be game to maybe have this go a little beyond just a one-night stand.
Of course pack politics and some pretty underhanded conniving puts Mark at risk. Alec has to wrestle with his protective feelings for Mark as well as his loyalty to his pack and his desire not to put Mark in danger. And when it comes down to the alpha council and a position that neither ever saw themselves in, Mark and Alec have to put everything on the line.
Whew! There is a lot of excitement and suspense in this one. A bad actor from previous books gets his comeuppance, so that is a moment with cheering! Mark and Alec dance around their attraction and what it could be for a lot of the story, but that’s to be expected since they are in the middle of political and rather diabolical machinations. Neither wants to see the other hurt, but they continue to be drawn to each other and when the possibility of a real bond forming – which they didn’t expect or really even desire at first – they begin to see that maybe there is something more here than meets the eye. I really liked both characters and Alec becomes a much more sympathetic character in this episode as we finally get the full story of his experience during the pack wars that have set him at odds with Nathan, our book 1 MC. The suspense built during the entire book and the pacing made me want to listen faster to know what would happen to everyone 🙂 I’m still getting used to the narrator, but I like his voices in this one a bit more than the previous two. Recommended and I can’t wait til the next book.
RATING: 
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