| Ruining Hattie by P. Rayne is now live! A man with no limits is the most dangerous kind of threat. When Trent Clarke caught me picking pockets at eleven, he didn’t turn me in. Instead, he took me under his wing and taught me that in this world, you take what you want and never look back. He might have shaped me, but I built my empire of the most successful string of strip clubs on the West Coast. Now that I have everything, it’s time to track down my deadbeat mother and remind her who she left behind. That is if the drugs didn’t kill her already. But I don’t find the worn-down shell of the woman I remember. Instead, she has all the things she never managed to give me—the white picket fence, a family dog, even church on Sunday mornings. The real kicker? She replaced me and raised the perfect daughter with all the care and love she never gave me. A twisted need for revenge roars to life inside me, and I aim it at my mother’s precious stepdaughter—sweet, sheltered Hattie Sinclair. At first, it’s purely about vengeance, pulling Hattie into the darkness to watch her innocence unravel piece by piece. But she becomes something more. Something dangerous. Something I can’t resist. Until she becomes my obsession. Download today or read for FREE with Kindle UnlimitedAmazon: https://books2read.com/RH Goodreads: https://bit.ly/3F6KRKo |
Sunny Shelly’s Review: 4 Stars
Stalker romances aren’t my favorite, but I was fascinated by Bastion as Arianna’s brother in His Subordinate, and I liked P. Rayne’s stalker romance His Obsession. So I wanted to give Ruining Hattie a whirl, and I am so glad that I did.
Bastion did not lead an easy life. His mother was a drug addict who often neglected him, which led him to run away from home and ultimately be taken in by Arianna’s dad, Trent. Living life as a family of con artists wasn’t easy either, but at least it was a step up from the life Bastion had with his mom. Ruining Hattie takes place a decade after His Subordinate, and Bastion has decided to look up his birth mom to see what happened to her. Much to his surprise, his mom got clean, got healthy, owns her own salon, got remarried… and has a stepdaughter whom she dotes upon.
Thus, Bastion’s revenge plot is born: get Hattie to fall in love with him, not knowing that he is her stepbrother, and ruin her life as a way to get back at Carla. But of course, he never expected to develop genuine feelings for the sweet, innocent, kindhearted ingenue. And when Bastian’s plot blows up in his face, it blows up spectacularly!
I loved the contrast between bad boy, con artist, strip club owner Bastion, and naive, sheltered, Christian good-girl Hattie. As much as this was a dark stalker romance, it was a coming-of-age story for Hattie as well. During her time with Bastion, she really blossomed and grew from a woman who was terrified of her own shadow at the start of the book. Hattie’s religious beliefs were such a huge part of who she was as a character, and I really loved how she came to realize that what she thought was morally wrong (ie, the strip club, sex and lust, etc.) wasn’t necessarily the case.
I was hooked on this opposites-attract couple, Hattie’s journey of self-discovery, Bastion’s change from charming schemer to a guy head-over-heels in love with his mark, and even the healing he was able to find in reconnecting with his mother.
I received an advanced copy and voluntarily left a review.
Sunny Shelly Reads 