Author: Brooke Edwards
Publisher: Dreamspinner Press
Pages/Word Count: 25 Pages
At a Glance: Brooke Edwards has written a good May/December romance filled with courtroom drama and relationship tension.
Reviewed By: Maryann
Blurb: James Carter is forty-five and has been a police officer most of his life. He married young, lost her young, and his life revolved around his work and his son. Young is a recurring theme in his life, he thinks, when he meets the considerably younger AUSA Derek Moore on a case and finds himself ruled by the whims of his heart.
The road to love between a hotshot lawyer and a veteran cop was never going to be smooth, not in the real world, but there are criminals, misunderstandings, and a lack of communication standing in their way too. Both are so stubborn and convinced their interest is one-sided that it takes a murder case, exhaustion, and an adjournment for them to get their act together. They move fast after that, but they both know there’s no guarantee for tomorrow.
Review: Chief James Carter has taken notice of Derek Moore, Assistant US Attorney. He has watched Derek in the court room, seen him at his precinct. And has met Derek over and over again…but only in his mind. The second time, he actually meets Derek is at the precinct, working on a case with Daniel Callahan, James’s partner. The third time, James responds to a 911 call and finds Derek has been beaten up. James asks Derek if he knows who attacked him, and he hints at someone he’d sent to prison. But then Ben, Derek’s future brother-in-law, speaks up and says he can give a description of the men, and that James could probably get the names from Daniel Callahan. When James calls Daniel and explains what’s going on, he can hear the concern in Daniel’s voice for Derek, and within just a few days, both men who’d attacked Derek are arrested, one by James and one by Daniel.
Brooke Edwards has written a very good May/December romance filled with courtroom drama and relationship tension. Though James spends a lot of time hoping his feelings for Derek will fade away—because he’s seen how Derek and Daniel react to each other—it’s not likely when a murder case lands in James’s lap, and he’s forced to spend long hours with Daniel and Derek, piecing together clues. All that time together, however, eventually leads to a single moment of eye contact between James and Derek, a moment where neither man seems willing or able to look away, and it opens up the door for so much more.
James and Derek are really good together, and I absolutely wanted more when Mens Rea ended. There are enough characters in this novellette for there to be another longer story, or even a series.
You can buy Mens Rea here:
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