Review: Blacklisted

Blacklisted by Jay Crownover
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

3.5 stars 

I received this book for free in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review. 

“I'm the one who is going to purposely cross your path. I'm never going to walk the other way when I see you coming. I'm going to head right toward you.” 

The third and final installment in the Loveless, Texas series about the Lawton siblings focuses on Dr. Presley Baskins, the half-sibling new to the family. Blacklisted starts right where the second in the series, Unforgiven left off. Presley's half-sister Kody called her to come help a man who was shot. The man turns out to be Palmer “Shot” Caldwell, the president of the motorcycle club Sons of Sorrow. Presley saves his life and is told the club owes her a favor and she can collect anytime. Shot gets antsy after three months of Presley not calling in the favor and ends up staking out her apartment to try and get a read on who his club owes a favor. When Presley comes out to confront him about stalking her, they have an instant pull between them, they also get shot at and with both thinking they were the target, the story takes off from there. 

 I'd spent so long being calm and serene for the comfort of others, I'd forgotten how cathartic anger could be when it was called for. 

This would be technically possible to start without reading the first two (there's also a novella) but you'd miss out on family dynamics and the latter half of this was a lovely wrap-up and send-off of the series that newbies wouldn't get the full emotional impact as much as readers of the series would. I was kind of surprised at how calm and measured the characters, story, and pace was in this. While Shot is the president of Sons of Sorrow, we get almost zero of any motorcycle club story or atmosphere. There are a couple scenes with his vice president Top and their friendship, a mention of dealings out of the country, some prospects guarding Presley, and Presley dealing with not knowing where Shot is because of club business. Shot talks about how the club is a family for him but without scenes with and about, I got no emotional connection from that aspect. I did like how the story focused on Presley and Shot's emerging relationship. They're both closer to forty and I think that came through with how quiet and thoughtful their relationship was at times. The suspense and action lingered on the edges and came from Presley's issue with a former friend that was introduced in the second in the series. 

 “When I'm with her, things get quiet. I can hear myself think.” 

When Presley was brought into the series, the Lawton siblings had no idea about her and then circumstances lined up to make them think that Presley killed their dad to collect her inheritance. The circumstances turned out to be a friend of Presley's named Ashby who has now gone full single white female. Presley got a promotion that would make her Chief Medical Examiner and while Ashby had been content subtly undercutting Presley through their whole friendship, she freaks out and really starts ramping things up. Presley grew-up with just her mother who suffered from kidney disease and this, coupled with how intelligent she was, isolated her and made her a bit of a workaholic. It's only when she suspects that Ashby might have murdered her mother that Presley lets her anger free and decides to leave protective custody and become proactive in getting Ashby finally caught. There's some help from Shot, acting on a favor Presley asks of him, setting guards on her, and helping her be stronger. Presley's half-brother's, a sheriff and Texas Ranger, come up with an idea to have Shot act all lovey dovey with Presley to make Ashby jealous and try to flush her out that way. They want him to get Ashby alone and try to get her to admit on wire all the things she did but they also don't want him to tell Presley about it. As you can guess, this set-up makes for a sure late act disturbance full of danger, mistrust, and hurt. 

“I see all the things you don't see. I see how strong you are. I see how resilient you are. I see how brave you are. I see how sexy you are. All the things you've always overlooked. I see them clear as day.” 

While I missed more of Shot's background and interaction with his club brothers, I was pleasantly surprised at how sweet he was; he delivers some truly sigh worthy lines to Presley. The suspense lingering on the edges did its job to create some tension and get our leads together but the single white female aspect got a bit wild at times. The ending provided for a pleasantly gratifying close to the Lawton siblings' stories that will leave series readers satisfying and smiling.

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