Hidden With You (Stark Security 7) by J. Kenner-a review

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ABOUT THE BOOK: Release Date April 26, 2022

He was hired to kill her. He never expected to fall in love with her.

Former MI6 agent Jasper Kent gave up being a good man when his wife and daughter were murdered. Now, he’s a paid assassin for the highest bidder, using the payouts from his underworld contracts to fund his search for the man who killed his family. He gets the break he desperately craves when he’s invited to join Stark Security, a legitimate organization that knows nothing about his deadly side hustle, but provides the cover he needs for his private missions.

Then he hits the jackpot — kill the woman he’s been assigned to protect, and his payment will be the identity of the man who murdered his family.

Heiress Zelda Clayton has spent her life projecting a bubbly personality, certain that if she shows her darkness, she’ll be abandoned once again. Now the pulse-pounding attraction between her and devastatingly gorgeous bodyguard Jasper Kent is off the charts, and she’s terrified he will leave, too, breaking her heart right as she’s falling in love with him.

But a broken heart may be the least of Zelda’s worries

•••••

REVIEW: HIDDEN WITH YOU is the eighth instalment in J. Kenner’s contemporary, adult STARK SECURITY erotic, romantic suspense series-a part of the author’s Stark World. This is forty-four year old, former MI6 agent Jasper Kent, and twenty-three year old, author/heiress Zelda Clayton’s story line. HIDDEN WITH YOU can be read as a stand alone without any difficulty. Any important information from the previous story lines is revealed where necessary.

Told from first person (Zelda) and third person (Jasper) perspectives HIDDEN WITH YOU follows the building but acrimonious relationship between forty-four year old, former MI6 agent Jasper Kent, and twenty-three year old, author/heiress Zelda Clayton. Years earlier former MI6 agent Jasper Kent lost his daughter Bonnie, and his wife Sandra, to a killer. Having searched for the person(s) responsible but to no avail, Jasper has moved to America where he begins working for the Stark Security organization in the hopes of using their resources to uncover the truth but Jasper never expected to come face to face with twenty-three year old author Zelda Clayton, a woman who stirs something deep within our story line hero, something Jasper had thought he lost a long time ago. From the outset, Jasper struggles with his attraction to a woman who is not his beloved wife, but a message from a stranger pits Jasper’s need for revenge, against the building love he feels for our story line heroine, a message that places Zelda in the direct line of fire. Enter author/heiress Zelda Clayton, and the woman with whom Jasper will fall in love. What ensues is the insta-lust to love relationship between Jasper and Zelda, and the potential fall-out as our heroine is targeted, and Jasper isn’t the only assassin hired for the job.

Zelda Clayton does not have a close relationship with her mother, in the years since her father’s death, and her mother’s remarriage to former CIA operative Carter Malloy but the estrangement has never stopped Zelda from becoming her own woman, a woman who is now the target of an unknown assassin. Zelda’s attraction to Jasper was immediate but Jasper’s less than warm reception left Zelda, once again, reeling at another rejection from the men in her life. Jasper Kent’s only path in life is to discover the truth about the murder of his wife and child but when a message come through, promising to reveal the who, how and why, Jasper battles between head and heart knowing that to finally feel peace means to destroy the woman with whom he is falling in love.

The relationship between Jasper and Zelda is an age-gap romance; one of immediate attraction but when Zelda becomes the ‘aggressor’ Jasper struggles with the memories of his wife, the grief, and his inability to move forward. Zelda knows that a permanent relationship with Jasper is never going to happen as Zelda is unable to compete with memory of the past, a ghost Jasper is unable to let go. The $ex scenes are intimate and passionate but I dislike the use of a certain four-letter word (although only used once) in my romance story lines.

There is a large ensemble cast of colorful and familiar secondary and supporting characters, most of whom we have met in previous story lines including Nikki and Damien, Jamie and Ryan, Evelyn, Ollie and Trevor. We are introduced to Stark Security’s new Research and Analysis specialist Owen Porter, as well Leah Ramirez, Zelda’s friend Camille, and Zelda’s mother Amelia and step father Carter Malloy.

HIDDEN WITH YOU is a story of power and greed, betrayal and vengeance, acceptance and moving forward. The fast paced premise is captivating and engaging; the romance is seductive and steamy; the characters are dynamic and broken.

Reading Order and Previous Reviews
Shadows of You .5
Shattered with You
Broken with You
Ruined With You
Wrecked with You
Destroyed with You
Memories of You
Ravaged with You

Copy supplied for review

Reviewed by Sandy

J. Kenner (aka Julie Kenner) is the New York Times, USA Today, Publishers Weekly, Wall Street Journal and #1 International bestselling author of over seventy novels, novellas and short stories in a variety of genres.

Though known primarily for her award-winning and international bestselling erotic romances (including the Stark and Most Wanted series) that have reached as high as #2 on the New York Times bestseller list, JK has been writing full time for over a decade in a variety of genres including paranormal and contemporary romance, “chicklit” suspense, urban fantasy, and paranormal mommy lit.

JK has been praised by Publishers Weekly as an author with a “flair for dialogue and eccentric characterizations” and by RT Bookclub for having “cornered the market on sinfully attractive, dominant antiheroes and the women who swoon for them.” A five time finalist for Romance Writers of America’s prestigious RITA award, JK took home the first RITA trophy awarded in the category of erotic romance in 2014 for her novel, Claim Me (book 2 of her Stark Trilogy). Her Demon Hunting Soccer Mom series (as Julie Kenner) is currently in development with AwesomenessTV/Awestruck.

Her books have sold over three million copies and are published in over twenty languages.

In her previous career as an attorney, JK worked as a clerk on the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and practiced primarily civil, entertainment and First Amendment litigation in Los Angeles and Irvine, California, as well as in Austin, Texas. She currently lives in Central Texas, with her husband, two daughters, and two rather spastic cats.

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