Title: BEAUTIFUL COLLISION
Series: Desperation #1
Author: Toni Vallan
Publish Date: 12.07.14
Publisher: Infinite Ink Books
Category /Genre: Contemporary Romance, Suspense
Recommended for: 18+ due to sexual content
Received from: Toni Vallan (in exchange for an honest review)
Tour by: Dowie’s Place
Goodreads link: Beautiful Collision
Date completed: 12.17.14
Description from the publisher:
Eighteen year old Gray McAllister is on the run. Leaving her
dangerous past behind her is easier said than done, even when she finds herself
at last able to forge a new life.
But then the planets align and Gray finds herself bumping into super-hot Thane Blackwell. Drooling over him from afar is safe but that's only until she is forced to look after Thane while he recovers from surgery.
Being holed up in her apartment is a bad, bad idea. Can Gray control the fire that Thane seems to light inside her, or will she give in to her deepest desires? Can Thane achieve his goal without hurting Gray in the process?
The stakes are impossibly high, but love and lies don't play nice with each other. Will Gray's past catch up with her first? Or will Thane's own secrets explode and tear them apart?
But then the planets align and Gray finds herself bumping into super-hot Thane Blackwell. Drooling over him from afar is safe but that's only until she is forced to look after Thane while he recovers from surgery.
Being holed up in her apartment is a bad, bad idea. Can Gray control the fire that Thane seems to light inside her, or will she give in to her deepest desires? Can Thane achieve his goal without hurting Gray in the process?
The stakes are impossibly high, but love and lies don't play nice with each other. Will Gray's past catch up with her first? Or will Thane's own secrets explode and tear them apart?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
This is the first book in the
Desperation series. They absolutely must
be read in order.
I love how Toni Vallan kept the
suspense going in this story, slowly meting out background and clues in
flashbacks. Why is Gray on the run? Who is Thane?
They both have secrets. Will they
trust one another? Will they give in to
the fire building between them?
This is the first story I have read
from Toni Vallan and I loved it – with a capital L.
I would love to continue reading
this series, but I am making the suggestion that an American friend is
needed. There are idiom errors that show
the difference in our cultures. While
not bad, it was a bit of a distraction. I
love the story so much, that I will offer my personal services as a beta reader,
if requested. In addition to the idiom
errors, there was one glaring continuity error – if Gray’s parents died six
years ago when she was fourteen, then she can’t be an eighteen year old now. I was a math teacher in a former career, and
I about had a coronary dealing with that one! LOL!! All of that said – don’t miss this book. Don’t miss this series!
Grammar/editing: ungraded – book
received as an unedited ARC / errors excused
The Desperation Series:
- Beautiful Collision
- Beautiful Conviction
Other Books from Toni Vallan:
- Dark Shadows
Despite the dark glasses, I blink
against the sunlight as it stings my skin. But I keep my eyes firmly on my
mark. The girl is easy to track. Inexperienced. Naive. Thinks she isn’t being
followed. It’s there in the false confidence of the way she walks, the way she
holds her shoulders. Maybe it’s because I’m good at my job. Good enough that my target will never know how
long I’ve tracked them, or how much time I spent watching them. I’m hoping it’s
because I’m better than most at my job. Otherwise
the girl is a danger to herself.
I’m standing beneath a tree, amidst
the bustle of midday sidewalk traffic, the shadows of the branches and sparse
leaves providing meager cover in the baking sun. I’m watching as Sara Roshkov
hurries across the busy road toward the entrance to the San Francisco Public
Library. I have little idea what she’s come to the library for, which makes me
more than curious. I can’t imagine she’d be loaning out a book; not now, when
her life is in such turmoil. That leaves the option I don’t like – meeting
someone.
The thought spurs me to move and I
wait only until she’d reaches the top step before I jog across Larkin and enter
the building after her. The cool air is a shock against my sweat-covered skin
and I’m momentarily blinded going from bright sun to shaded interior. I keep my
sunglasses on, habit and protection. She’s hurrying up the marble stairs and I
pause to watch her, pretending to admire the high, glass ceiling of the atrium.
I follow her up the stairs and watch her enter General Fiction. My shoes don’t
make any sound on the stairs and I know she has no idea she’s being followed.
Her hair is short and black today, a
wig she’s been using since she arrived in San Francisco. She keeps her neck
straight and stiff. Seems she knows not to appear as if she’s looking over her
shoulder. I’m not sure what she’s learned from her father but she sure has to
learn a lot more about running and hiding so the likes I’ve been tracking her
for a while now and I feel a pull of something as I watch her. There is a
fragile air to her and she’s lost weight, the hollows of her cheeks proof that
life on the run doesn’t exactly involve luxuries like three square meals a day.
And Sara Roshkov is used to a life of luxury considering the family.
I follow, grabbing a book from the
bestseller shelf beside me, keeping sufficient distance between us that she’d
see nothing suspicious should she turn around. What she would see is a young
guy, black jeans, black tee, black sneakers, much like her own dark clothing.
The hoodie I’m wearing is equally nondescript, the ball cap plain too. Nothing
I wore would stand out in a person’s memory should they spot me. My black hair
is short, the style efficient and easy to maintain. Again nothing to remember
me by.
She sneaks a look over her shoulder
as she enters an aisle up ahead but her eyes graze my face and her gaze seeks
further beyond me. I flip through the book and then enter the aisle next to
her. She’s facing me and I can watch her through the stacks without her seeing
me. She’s already halfway down her row, finger running along the covers as she
searches for her book.
It feels a little voyeuristic but
hell, the full scope of my job is inherently voyeuristic. I keep my attention
on her as her finger stops on one particular book. Her expression is satisfied;
she’s found the book she wants but before she takes it off the shelf her eyes
cloud, the gray darkening to dark metal; a moment of doubt that shows on her
face as if she battles the monsters within.
As much as I can read people, their
eyes, their body language, it’s what goes on inside their heads that eludes
even the best of us. Nobody can train you for that.
She straightens her back and then
tilts the book toward her. taking it down from the shelf with extra care.
She flips to the back of the book
and slowly the pieces fall into place. Someone has left something for her in
that particular book. There are a number of possibilities but it’s clear that
someone is helping her. Is it someone within her family? Roshkov had always
kept his personal life totally private. Not that our surveillance hadn’t picked
up on his many mistresses or his other extracurricular activities. The man was
involved in everything from human trafficking to drug-running. No wonder his
wife, having left for St. Petersburg a year ago, is still to return. Something
is rotten in the Roshkov paradise perhaps?
Now, as I study his daughter I
wonder if her mother is the wife in Russia or is she the offspring of one of
Roshkov many affairs? There is too much we still need to know about Sara and
perhaps we will get our break soon. One thing I do know is that she has a
heart, that there is a goodness in her.
There is no way for me to tell what
the book hides and any attempt to find out will likely jeopardize the mission.
I could pass her by and steal the book from her without her even realizing it
happened. But that She has what she wants, so now she heads out, and her
shoulders relax a little. She thinks the coast is clear.
I allow her that misconception. I
hang back as she leaves the library, keeping my distance as she exits the
building and heads back into the sunshine.
I’m her shadow as she hurries to a fast
food joint where she buys a couple burgers and then keeps moving. I follow, my
awareness turned on to full blast.
She heads further west, into the
Tenderloin area of San Francisco. It didn’t surprise me that she’d chosen one
of the most dangerous parts of the city to hide out in. What does surprise me
is that she’s had the guts to stay there this long, hiding among the homeless
and the drug dealers. People get killed every night in this area and so far
she’s survived. If anything she is resourceful.
I’ve watched the building in which
she’d found a place to sleep, cased the place once when she’d left for a soup
kitchen a few blocks away. Other than that, I just watch and report back on her
activities. Despite my impatience that we were too slow in getting info,
despite my need for us to reacher the next level of this investigation in which
we take Roshkov down, despite all my personal feeling I must remain
clearheaded, keep my head in the game.
Now I watch her enter the deserted
building as I lean against a light pole and pretend to light a cigarette.
I hear the buzz in my earwig that
indicates someone is being patched through.
I press the button on the comms.
“Eagle here, over.” My eyes don’t move from the mark.
“This is HQ, do you have a situation
report, over.”
RAFFLECOPTER<<<<<
Thank you [Dowie’s Place] for
hosting this tour.
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