4.25 stars--DEFENDING RAVEN is the seventh and final instalment in Susan Stoker’s contemporary, adult MOUNTAIN MERCENARIES romantic suspense series focusing group of former soldiers and Navy SEALS who call themselves Mountain Mercenaries, headed by the mysterious ‘Rex’. This is Dave ‘Rex’ Justice , and Raven aka Mag’s story line. The Mountain Mercenaries is a spin off from the author’s Ace Security series but you do not have to have read the previous series to understand or follow the current timeline. The Mountain Mercenaries were first introduced in CLAIMING FELICITY (Ace Security 4).

WARNING: Due to the nature of the story line premise, there may be some triggers for more sensitive readers.

NOTE: If you have not read the previous instalment there may be some spoilers in my review.

Told from dual third person perspectives (Raven and Dave) DEFENDING RAVEN is the culmination of seven story lines in which the mysterious Rex, takes command of a group of former military operatives in an effort to rescue and recover missing women and children around the world but to everyone’s surprise their mysterious leader and benefactor is their friend and bar owner David Justice, a man whose own wife has been missing for close to ten years. With the rescue of Zara Layne in Defending Zara #6, Dave and the Mountain Mercenaries will discover that Zara’s friend and fellow abductee Mags is none other than Dave aka Rex’s missing wife. As Dave organizes a rescue of the woman he loves, the team worry that our hero is in over his head. What ensues is the rescue and recovery of Raven Justice, and the potential fall-out as Raven refuses to leave Lima, Peru without someone she holds close to her heart.

Mags aka Raven Justice has spent ten years helping other women who have suffered as much as our storyline heroine. Abducted and sold in to sexual slavery, Raven has ‘aged’ out of the system but not out of ‘that’ world in Lima, Peru. With the appearance of her husband Dave, Raven struggles with the demons from her past, demons that refuse to let go including the possibility that her husband no longer loves the woman she has become.

Dave ‘Rex’ Justice is a man tormented by the idea that has wife has suffered at the hands of so many monsters. With Raven’s refusal to walk away from the life she now leads, Dave suspects something deeper keeping his wife from returning home.

The relationship between Dave and Raven struggles in the face of Raven’s inability to accept that her husband is still in love but Raven has a secret that goes much deeper than anything Dave could have ever imagined, a secret that keeps Raven in Lima, Peru. There are no $ex scenes but recounting of the horrors that our heroine endured.

All of the previous story line heroes play secondary and supporting roles as their friend and mentor is desperate to rescue the woman he loves. With the help of the Mountain Mercenaries, Dave Justice will bring his wife home after ten long years missing.

DEFENDING RAVEN is raw and gritty story of struggle and abuse, survival and redemption; of courage, tenderness and enduring love. The premise is heart breaking and impassioned; the characters are colorful, strong, dramatic and intense. DEFENDING RAVEN fast forwards several years so that the reader gets a glimpse into the future of the Mountain Mercenaries and their leader Dave ‘Rex’ Justice.



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