"Exotic and sensual tale of a returning hero dealing with his guilt and finding true love."
Reviewed by Kay Quintin
Posted October 23, 2012
Romance Series | Romance
Jacob Wilde returns home to the El Sueno (The Dream)
ranch in Wilde's Crossing, Texas after leaving the army as a
hero. A Blackhawk pilot, Jake returns loaded with guilt
over the lives lost for which he assumes the guilt.
Missing one eye and a scarred face, the man avoids contacts
and is especially unhappy at a homecoming. With two
brothers, Travis & Caleb encouraging him to come home, he
also has his half-sisters, Lissa, Em and Jaimie
strengthening their battle. Expecting only family, he
arrives home to what seems like the whole town.
Eye contact with a gorgeous sexy woman leaves Jake
tongue-tied. That is until he believes she is there to help
his brothers' plea to stay in Wilde's Crossing and become
the CEO of the El Sueno and its half a million acres and
other resources. Approaching Addison McDowell angry and in
the wrong state of mind precipitates an out and out battle
between the two. Addison has inherited an old farm from
Charles Hilton, an elderly man she worked for in Manhattan .
Riling her feathers and rubbing her the wrong way with his
accusations is just the beginning. Cooling down, Jake owes
her an apology, which almost immediately turns into a stab
of intensive sexual heat for both of them. Continuing their
liaison and unable to separate skin from skin, Jake's
horrible nightmares are soon resurfacing. Even being in
love with Addison is not enough to heal his wounds.
Breaking her loose for her own protection sends her back to
New York and him into seclusion. Secretly buying Addison's
ranch, Jake knows he has finally faced his horrors and
living without Addison is no longer a possibility.
This wonderful story is the first in the Wilde Brothers
dynasty. I was completely captivated by this exciting story
of the youngest Wilde brother. I cannot wait to read the
2nd in the series about Caleb. If this doesn't keep your
heart pounding and your blood boiling hot, nothing will!
All the brothers are sexy specimens of the male species as well
as rich and handsome to boot. I loved THE DANGEROUS JACOB
WILDE! Don't miss
this hot series.
SUMMARY
Jacob Wilde lived a fast and furious life of reckless
abandon…until his wild streak put a cruel end to a life
spent in pursuit of pleasure… The Texan ranching grapevine is legendary, so Addison
McDowell has heard all about Jacob Wilde's shameless
past—and his scarred, solitary present. But her only focus
is her future—which won't include this impossibly arrogant
man! Addison is no Texan wallflower—when Jake starts a fight,
she's more than capable of finishing it! However, a searing
attraction to a man she knows cannot love her back? That she
has no idea how to handle….
ExcerptCHAPTER ONE
All his life, Jake Wilde had been a man women wanted and
men envied.
At sixteen, he was a football hero. He had his pilot's
license. He dated the Homecoming Queen... and all the
princesses in her court, one at a time, of course, because
he had scruples—and because, even then, he understood
women.
He was smart, too and ruggedly good–looking,
enough so that some guy had once stopped him on the street
in Dallas to ask if he'd ever considered heading east to
sign as a model.
Jake almost decked him until he realized it wasn't a
come–on but a serious offer. He thanked him,
said 'no,' and could hardly wait to drive his truck back
to his family's enormous ranch so he could laugh about it
with his brothers.
In a word, life was good.
.
Time blurred.
College. Three years of it, anyway. Then, for reasons
that made sense at the time, he'd enlisted.
One way or another, all the Wildes had served their
country, Travis as a hotshot fighter pilot, Caleb as an
operative in one of those alphabet–soup government
agencies nobody talked about. For Jake, it had been the
army and a coveted assignment, flying Blackhawk helicopter
on dangerous missions.
Then, in a heartbeat, everything changed.
His world. His life. The very principles that had
always defined him.
And yet—
And yet, some things did not change.
He hadn't quite realized that until a night in early
spring as he tooled along a pitch–black Texas road,
heading for home.
Jake scowled into the darkness.
Correction.
He was heading for the place where he'd grown up. He
didn't think of it as home anymore, didn't think of
anyplace as home.
He'd been away four long years. To be precise, four
years, one month and fourteen days.
Still, the road seemed as familiar as the back of his
hand.
So had the drive from the Dallas–Fort Worth
airport.
Fifty miles of highway, the turn onto Country Road 227,
the endless length of it bordered on either side by fence
posts, the cattle standing still as sentinels in the quiet
of night and then, almost an hour later, the
bashed–in section of fence that seemed to have always
marked the juncture where a nameless dirt road angled off
to old man Chambers' spread.
And he'd only stopped to check for IEDs once.
A record.
Jake made the turn onto the road, even after all these
years automatically steering the '63 Thunderbird around the
pothole by the bashed in fence that marked the Chambers
boundary. It was on the old man's land, which was why
nobody had filled it in.
"Don't need nobody messin' with my property," Elijah
Chambers would mumble if anyone was foolish enough to
suggest it.
Jake's father despised the old guy but then, the General
despised anybody who wasn't into spit and polish.
Even his own sons.
You grew up with a four star father, you were expected
to lead a four star life.
Caleb used to say that when they were kids. Or maybe it
had been Travis.
Maybe it had even been him, Jake thought, and came as
close to a smile as he had in a very long time, but he
squelched it, fast.
A man learned to avoid smiling when the end result might
scare the crap out of small children.
Jake drummed his fingers against the steering wheel.
Maybe his best move was to turn the car around and head
for...
Where?
Not D.C. Not the hospital. If he never saw another
hospital in his lifetime, it would be too soon. Not the
base or his townhouse in Georgetown. Too many memories and
besides, he didn't belong on the base or in D.C. anymore,
and he'd sold the townhouse, signed the papers just
yesterday.
The truth was, he didn't belong anywhere, not even here
in Texas and absolutely not on the half–million acres
of rolling hills and grassland that was El Sonar.
Which was why he had no intention of staying very long.
His brothers knew it and were doing their best to talk
him out of leaving.
"This is where you belong, man," Travis had said.
"This is your home," Caleb had added. "Just settle in,
take it easy for a while, get your bearings while you
figure out what you want to do next."
Jake shifted his weight, stretched his legs as much as
he could. The Thunderbird was a little cramped for a man
who stood six foot three in his bare feet, but you made
sacrifices for a car you'd rebuilt a car more the summer
you were sixteen.
Caleb made it sound easy.
It wasn't.
He had no idea what he wanted to do next, not unless it
involved turning back time and returning to the place where
it had stopped, in a narrow pass surrounded by mountains
that needled into a dirty grey sky...
"Stop it," he said, his voice sharp in the silence.
None of that.
He was going to spend a couple of days at the ranch. See
his sisters. His brothers. His father.
Then he'd take off.
Seeing his sisters would be great, as long as they
didn't do anything stupid like tearing up. The General?
That would be okay, too. He'd probably give him a pep talk
and as long as it didn't go on forever, he'd survive it.
As for his brothers...
To hell with it. There was nobody here to see what
passed for a smile on his scarred face and the simple truth
was, thinking about Caleb and Travis always made him smile.
The Wilde brothers had always been close. Played
together as little kids, got into scrapes together as
teens. For as long as any of them could remember, they'd
always loved the same things. Fast cars. Beautiful women.
Trouble, with a capital 'T.'
Peas in a pod, their sisters teased.
Half–sisters—the General had been married
twice and the brothers and sisters had different
mothers—and it was true.
Peas in a pod, for sure.
They were still close, even now, otherwise they wouldn't
have been able to talk him into this visit—
Except, he'd done it on his own terms.
Well, more or less.
They'd wanted to send a jet for him.
"We have two of the damned things at El Sonar," Travis
had said. "Hey, you know that better than we do. You're the
guy who bought them, supervised their interior
design, that whole bit. Why fly commercial if you don't
have to?"
Why, indeed?
The part Travis hadn't mentioned was that Jake hadn't
only bought the Wilde planes, he'd piloted them.
Not now.
A pilot with one functional eye wasn't a pilot anymore,
and the thought of returning home as a passenger on a jet
he'd once flown was more than he figured he could handle.
So he'd told his brothers he didn't know when he'd be
able to leave, blah blah blah, and finally, they'd eased
off.
"It'll be simpler all around if I just get in Friday
evening and rent a car."
As if, he thought now, and smiled again.
He'd been paged as soon as he stepped into the
Dallas–Fort Worth airport. He'd considered ignoring
the page but finally he'd gritted his teeth and marched up
to the arrivals desk.
"Captain Jacob Wilde," he'd said briskly. "You've been
paging me."
The clerk behind the counter had her back to him. She'd
turned, professional smile in place...
And blanched.
"Oh," she'd stammered, "oh..."
It had taken all his determination not to tell her that
yeah, despite the eye patch, she was looking at a face that
was better suited to Halloween.
He had to give her credit. She'd recovered, fast. Got
back her phony smile.
"Sir," she'd said, "we have something for you."
Something for him? What? It had better not be what some
of the guys in the hospital had told him about, a welcoming
committee of serious–faced civilians, all wanting to
shake his hand.
No.
Thank God, it hadn't been that.
It had been a manila envelope.
Inside, he'd found a set of keys, directions to a
particular parking garage...
And a note, his brothers' names scrawled at the bottom.
Did you really think you could fool us?
They'd left him his old Thunderbird to drive home.
It had been a crazy thing to do.
A damned crazy thing, indeed, Jake thought, and
swallowed past a sudden tightness in his throat.
The car had made the miles through the endless expanse
that was north Texas easier...
And, suddenly, there it was.
The wide gate that marked the northernmost boundary of
El Sonar.
Jake slowed the car, then let it roll to a stop.
He'd forgotten what it was like, seeing that huge wooden
gate, the weathered cedar sign that spelled out El
Sonar—The Dream—in big bronze letters.
It was all the same, except for the fact that the gate
stood open.
His sisters' idea, he was certain, a sweet way Lissa,
Em and Jamie had thought of to welcome him and remind him
that this was his home. They'd be hurt when they realized
home was the last place he wanted to be but he didn't see
any way around it.
He had to keep moving.
He stepped hard on the gas and drove through the open
gate, a rooster–tail of Texas dust pluming out
behind him.
He wouldn't even have come this weekend, except he'd run
out of excuses.
"Yeah. Well, I'll see what I can do," Jake had
replied, and Caleb had said, very calmly, fine, good plan,
and if he decided that what he couldn't do was come home
for a visit then, by God, he and Travis would have no
choice but to fly to D.C., hogtie him and drag his sorry
ass home.
For all he knew, they would have.
Jake had thought it over and decided it was time to show
his face—and wasn't that one hell of an expression to
use, he thought grimly.
It wouldn't come as a surprise to his family. They'd all
been at the hospital, waiting, when the transport plane
first brought him back to the States. His sisters, his
brothers, even the General, reminding everybody he was John
Hamilton Wilde, General John Hamilton Wilde, United States
Army, and he damned well wanted a private room for his
wounded son and the attention of the best surgeons at
Walter Reed.
Jake had been too out of it to argue but as the days and
weeks crawled by, as he came off the painkillers and his
head began to function again, he'd laid down the law.
No more special treatment.
And no more family visits.
There was no point, no reason, no way he wanted to watch
Em and Lissa and Jamie trying to be brave, his brothers
pretending he'd be back to himself in no time, his father
being, well, his father.
That was one of the reasons he'd taken so long to come
home, even for a visit.
"You're an idiot," Travis had growled.
Maybe.
But he didn't want to be fussed over, poked at, stroked
and soothed and told nothing had changed because everything
had. His face. His sense of self.
Was he even a man anymore?
It was a damn good question.
A better one was, how did you dance between the reality
that everything was normal and the brutal knowledge that it
wasn't?
Forget that for now.
Tonight, his job was to put on a good show. Smile, as
long as he didn't terrify anybody. Talk, even though he
didn't have anything to say civilians would want to hear.
Behave as if time had not passed.
He'd figured coming to the ranch by himself would give
him the chance to acclimate. Immerse himself in familiar
things. Smell the clean Texas air and listen to the coyotes
making their beautiful music in the night.
All of that without an unwanted rush of emotion
engulfing him in a place like an airport.
Every solider he knew said the same thing.
Coming home was tough.
You went off to war, you were carried away by the
excitement of it, especially if you'd been raised on
stories of bravery and battles and warriors.
He sure as hell had.
Their mother was dead, gone when Travis was six, Caleb
four, Jake two. Housekeepers and nannies had raised them.
The General, the rare times he was home, regaled them
with stories about their ancestors, a hodgepodge of men
who'd marched on Gaul with Caesar, raided the British Isles
from longboats, crossed the Atlantic in sailing ships and
then conquered a vast new continent from the Dakota plains
to the Mexican border.
The stories had thrilled him.
Now, he knew they were nonsense.
Not the part about the warriors. He'd been one himself
these last years, fighting alongside honorable, brave men,
serving a nation he loved.
But his father had left things unsaid. The politicians.
The lies. The cover–ups.
Jake stood on the brakes. The Thunderbird skidded,
slewed sideways across the dirt road and came to a hard
stop. He crossed his hands on the steering wheel, wrist
over wrist.
He could hear his heart thumping.
He was heading straight back into that dark place he'd
sworn he wouldn't visit again.
He waited. Let his heartbeat slow. Then he opened the
door and stepped from the car.
Something brushed against his face. A moth.
Good. Moths were real. They were things a man could
understand.
He took a long gulp of cool night air. Tucked his hands
into his trouser pockets. Looked up at the stars, as cold
and distant as the polar ice caps.
Minutes passed. The stars came out from behind the
clouds, along with the moon. He got back into the ‘Bird and
drove on until, finally, he could see the outline of the
house, standing on a rise maybe an eighth of a mile away.
Light streamed from its windows.
Panic twisted in his gut.
He pulled onto the grass, stopped the car again and got
out.
There was a stand of old oaks to his left, and a
footpath that led through them.
Jake set out along the path. A breeze carrying the
gurgling sound of Coyote Creek winding, unseen, alongside,
accompanied him. Dry leaves crunched under the soles of the
cowboy boots he'd never given up wearing.
There'd been a time he'd loved nights like these. The
crystalline air. The distant glitter of the stars.
Back then, he'd look up at the sky as he just had and
wonder at the impossibility of standing on a planet
spinning through space.
His hand went to his eye socket. The taut skin below it.
Now, the only thing a night like this meant was that the
cold made his bones, his jaw, the empty space that had once
been an eye, ache.
Why would the eye hurt when it didn't exist anymore?
He'd asked the doctors and physical therapists the
question half a dozen times and always got the same answer.
His brain thought the eye was still there.
Yeah. Right.
Jake's mouth twisted.
Just went to prove what a useless thing a man's brain
could be.
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