Review: Officer Off Limits

Reviewed by Carrie

Tessa Bailey is becoming an auto-buy author for me. She writes such deliciously dirty talking alpha heroes that just make me sigh. This is the third book in the Line of Duty series and though loosely connected, each can be read as a stand alone.

Hot on the heels of a broken engagement, kindergarten teacher Story Brooks dashes across the country to be at the bedside of her estranged father, a New York cop. In the hospital she runs into her father’s protégé, Daniel Chase, and sparks fly. The only hitch in the plan is that dear old Dad forbids Daniel from hooking up with his daughter. This lasts all of a hot second and by the time Daniel takes Story home, he has her pinned up against a wall. She decides to use him for fun while she’s in town and as a way to get back on her feet after a long disappointing relationship, but both of them get much more than they bargained for.

Story is a cheeky girl who appears self-confident despite lingering insecurities from her ex and abandonment issues with her father. She is in a bit of an emotional block while coming to terms with the fact that she basically wasted the last 2 years on a guy that she really didn’t connect with and feeling like a failure. I liked that she stood up for herself and didn’t wallow.

Daniel was the one who threw me for a loop. I had expected a straight up cop hero but got a heart aching tortured hero - my favorite! Daniel grew up shuffling between foster homes, drifting without someone to give a crap about him until he joined the police force and was taken under the wing of Jack Brooks, Story’s father. Daniel matures in police work, but sticks to his womanizing ways because he doesn’t know how to care; he wasn’t ever taught. When Story tells Daniel she loves him and he says that’s the first time anyone had ever told him that, I wanted to rip my heart out and serve it on a platter to him. He just slowly unravels as this sensitive man underneath who survived a horrible childhood and ultimately just wants to belong to someone.

The sex between these two is insanely hot and all the dirty talk had me fanning myself. Besides the sex and romance, I loved all the banter in this book – Story and Daniel, Daniel and his boys, Story and her friend, Hayden. It really kicks up the fun and gives the main characters more depth. There is a slight twist to the story at about the 80% mark that was unexpected and felt a little unnecessary but that was really the only blemish on the book.

I really recommend this book for an unexpectedly sweet and sexy story! I can’t wait for the next one!

Rating: A-

*ARC Provided by Entangled

Click to purchase: Amazon

Officer Off Limits

by Tessa Bailey

Release Date: June 10, 2013 

Publisher: Entangled