Stay Close by Alexa Riley [Review]

Stay Close (For You #1) by Alexa Riley
Format: ebook
Source: provided through NetGalley
Disclaimer: As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases.
Date read: July 3, 2017

For You
1. Stay Close - Kindle
2. Hold Tight
3. Don't Go

Alexa Riley
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Synopsis (Goodreads):

A former Russian mafia soldier is hired to protect a friend’s young daughter, but he knows he’ll do more than keep her safe–he’ll make her his. Forever.

If she were to simply whisper my name, I would be at her feet, begging to touch what I shouldn’t, taste what doesn’t belong to me, run my hands along the sweet innocence she taunts me with.

Penelope Justice is eighteen, old enough to graduate high school but—according to her parents—not old enough to live without 24/7 security. Practice has made her an expert at ditching her bodyguards. One look at Ivan and she never wants to run again.

I’ve been hired to protect her.

I can’t help but think that perhaps someone should have protected her from me.

Ivan steals the breath right out of her lungs, something no boy has ever done. Then again, he’s far from a boy. This man, this man who looks like he could kill someone with the flick of a wrist, is everything. He is her future.

I can’t let her go and I won’t give her up. I’ve done bad things in my life, and I don’t deserve her. But I can’t do the honorable thing.

I’ve never been noble, and I’m not starting now

Thoughts on Stay Close: Things you can expect from an Alexa Riley romance: hard-hitting attraction between our two leads, plenty of sexy times, and a couple so dedicated to one another you might end up feeling a little faint.

Ivan and Penelope certainly tick off all the boxes in this book. Penny might be young, but she knows she and Ivan are meant for one another the first time she lays eyes on him. With his past, Ivan doesn't think he's good enough and tries to stay away. Kinda. Mostly there are a lot of smoldering looks and Ivan's iron-hard control being shredded.

He's it for her and she's it for him and the rest, as they say, is history. Sexy, sexy history. With a side order of explaining to Penny's parents how their romance happened. Let's face it, that's always fun in an awkward, uncomfortable sort of way.

Now I'm imagining all the way's Pandora's going to fall after her declaration that she wasn't going to do that love thing. Yeah, right. Just you wait, Pandora!