"The ultimate military romantic suspense novel!"
Reviewed by Patti Loveday
Posted February 24, 2018
Romance Paranormal | Romance Suspense | Romance Military
RIGHT THROUGH ME centers around Noah Gallagher who is the head
of a biotech firm and a soldier. He was picked off the streets by the
Obsidian Group as a teenager for an experiment to enhance him with
unique abilities and turn him into a super soldier. While leading a
rebellion against Obsidian, Noah manages to escape along with many
others being held, including his sister. Caro Bishop is on the run after being framed for murder. She is trying
to find odd jobs in order to stay out of sight and hidden from the
people trying to frame her. Hired as a belly dancer for a high-class
birthday party, Caro finds herself dancing for none other than Noah
Gallagher. Sparks immediately fly between them, creating a steamy
romance that will fog up your glasses and leave you feeling the heat
from off the pages. But when a treacherous enemy sets their sites on
destroying any happiness between Noah and Caro, they have to work
together to survive. I really enjoyed reading RIGHT
THROUGH ME and found it to be a very suspenseful romantic
read. This is the first book in the
Obsidian Files series and it is a very steamy addictive novel.
Shannon McKenna creates a very interesting group of characters you
will root for from the start. The setting and plot create the ultimate
military romantic suspense novel with a hint of paranormal. I look
forward to the next book in this series and more from this author.
SUMMARY
Stranger, speak softly...
Biotech tycoon
Noah
Gallagher has a deadly secret: his clandestine training
as a
super-soldier gives him abilities that go far beyond
human.
Yet he's very much a man. When Caro Bishop shows up at
his
Seattle headquarters with a dangerous secret agenda, his
ordered life is thrown into chaos. Caro is a woman like
no
other—and her luminously sensual beauty cloaks a mystery
he
must solve.
Caro's lying low, evading a false
charge
of murder. She means to clear her name, and she'll do
whatever it takes to survive—but seducing a man like Noah
is
more than she bargained for. His amber eyes have the
strangest glow when he looks at her—she could swear he
sees
the secrets of her heart. The desire smoldering in Noah's
eyes awakens her own secret hunger, but Caro has to
resist
his magnetic pull. Anyone close to her becomes a target.
The
only right thing to do is run, far and fast, but Caro
can't
outrun Noah's ferocious intensity—or deny the searing
passion that explodes between them.
Nothing else
matters—until a vicious enemy bent on the ultimate
revenge
puts his murderous plan into play. Noah and Caro must
battle
for their lives...and their love...
ExcerptSomeone just cut the lights. What the hell?Noah Gallagher put down his pen and looked around,
startled, as drums began to thump from the hidden sound
system of the penthouse conference room. Some exotic
instrument joined in, throbbing and wailing. The door to the conference room opened to a shimmery
jingling sound, then a flash of fluttering purple.
Everyone at the table was staring and murmuring. Oh, Christ. Not possible. Noah rose to his feet, but the
belly dancer was already halfway through the door, her
hands weaving in a hypnotic pattern. Wide, light-catching
green eyes laughed at him brazenly as she shimmied
straight toward him, leading with one pulsing hip. Her eyes caught him . . . and held him. The world narrowed down. Whatever he was going to say or
do stopped. Words were gone. Air was gone. Air didn’t
matter. Nothing moved while she moved. She had commandeered all movement. With that smile. Those
eyes. He was sitting again, with no memory of deciding to do
so. His mind had gone blank. The woman was like a
walking, breathing stun code, personally keyed to him.
He’d always wondered how it would feel to be one of the
unlucky chosen few at Midlands who’d gotten stun and kill
codes embedded in their minds. His own brain implants had
been bad enough. Stun and kill codes were worse. But this dancer wasn’t a goddamn stun code. She was just
a random woman, shaking her stuff. When her act was done,
he’d pull it together. Exert the f**king authority he was
entitled to as the CEO of Angel Enterprises. He had exactly until the music stopped to get control of
himself. Simple enough to figure out who’d dreamed up this
unwanted birthday present. His younger sister Hannah
lurked by the door. The wide-angle enhancement of his
sight made it possible to see the gleam in Hannah’s eyes
without looking away from the belly dancer for a single
second.
Not that he could have looked away. He saw his fianceé Simone’s face with his peripheral
vision. She’d chosen to sit at his side for this
important meeting. It was painfully obvious from her
tight, expectant smile that she was waiting for him to
turn to her, to smile and laugh and make light of this
stupid situation. Not just for her. For everyone in the
room. He couldn’t do it. Try. Do an analog dive. Grab a hook. Concentrate. A spotlight from somewhere gilded the dancer’s body,
highlighting every perfect detail. Silver anklets that
jingled over her small, bare feet. Golden toenails.
Shapely legs flashed between purple veils that floated
from a low-slung, glittering belt. The belt and top were
swagged with shining chains and dangling beadwork. Still
more chains, draped from an ornate headdress, dangled
over her forehead and under her chin, creating a constant
soft shimmer of sound. High, full breasts quivered, lovingly presented in the
spangle-studded velvet bra. She arched back, floating a
purple veil edged with spangles high in the air above
herself and swishing her thick fall of of glossy black
hair around. Had to be fake hair, falling to well below
her ass. It brushed the curve of her hips. Fanned out as
she twirled. Everything he’d monitored in his peripheral vision was
gone now. He no longer saw Hannah, or Simone, or anything
else. His inner vision was too busy with the vivid
fantasy of that woman straddling him. Imagining her bold,
sensual smile as she swayed over him, teased him. Running
her fingers through her hair, lifting it, tossing it.
Coiling it around her waist like a slave rope. He wanted to rip away all the filmy veils and all the
goddamn beads and chains. See her bare-assed. Bare-
breasted. Yeah. The deep curve of her waist was perfectly shaped for his
fingers to grip. The curves and hollows of her belly and
her hips looked so soft. Touchable. His hands shook with the urge to reach, stroke. Seize. The rush of erotic images ramped up his advanced visual
processor into screaming overdrive. Even with eyes
shielded from eighty percent of the ambient light, even
using a double layer of custom-designed shield specs, his
AVP combat program was off and running, scrolling a thick
column of data analysis past his inner eye. And even that couldn’t distract him from her show. Not
for one instant. His heightened senses reached out, so greedy for more
that he found himself actually taking off the back-up
shield specs. He’d have popped out the contacts, too, but
his AVP was already going nuts at the lower protection
level. Combine that with adrenaline, and a huge blast of
sexual arousal—f**k. The light level in this room could zap him into a stress
flashback if he didn’t protect his eyes. Not only that.
The dark shield strength contact lenses hid the animal
flash of amber luminosity caused by his visual implants.
Outsiders couldn’t be allowed to see that. The room was
packed with outsiders. He wanted them gone. Especially Simone. Which made him a total asshole. He
tried hard, really hard, to feel guilty. Not so much as a
twinge. His conscious mind had been almost totally
hijacked by the dancer. He wanted to throw everyone else out and lock the door.
Study that woman with his naked eyes, dancing under the
spotlight. But only for him. He wanted to gulp in the
whole data flow. It was being filtered out in real time
and lost to him forever, and it drove him . . . f**king .
. . nuts. And he couldn’t do a thing. Not with an audience. His
fists clenched in fury. Heart racing, temperature spiking. Sweating profusely. No
way to hide it. It was an AVP stress dump. A massive dose
of fight-and-conquer energy, channeling straight into his
dick, which strained desperately against his pants. He struggled to grab onto the analog hooks that he’d
established. His hooks were emergency mental shortcuts,
activating an instant, deep withdrawal into the ice caves
of his subconscious mind when the AVP got out of control.
Best way he could devise to calm his stress reactions and
stay on top of himself. Not a hook to be had. Couldn’t find them, couldn’t feel
them. Couldn’t use his highly developed power of
visualization at all, after years of grueling practice.
All gone. He was fully occupied imagining that woman naked and
writhing beneath him. His intense reaction to this spectacle made no sense.
He’d seen belly dancing before and been unmoved. He did
not have complicated fantasies or fetishes. He didn’t
even get the fun factor. He wasn’t known for his sense of
humor. In fact, he had no imagination at all, unless you
counted biotech engineering designs, or plotting ways to
grow his business, or scheming to keep his chosen family
alive, secret, and safe. That demanding enterprise left no bandwidth for fun and
games. He wasn’t playful about sex, either. He was tireless,
focused. Relentless in making sure that his partners were
satisfied. To the point of exhaustion, even. Theirs, not
his. They would tell him he was the hottest lover ever
and then call him cold. So? Noah didn’t do emotions. Cold was safer for everyone
concerned. Not that he could explain that to whoever happened to be
in bed with him. He couldn’t change his nature. He saw to it that his
lovers had many orgasms to his one, to compensate for
those mysterious intangibles. Whatever the f**k else they
wanted from him, it just wasn’t there. He didn’t even
know where to look for it. The dancer’s arms lifted, swayed. He inhaled the scent of
her dewy skin as she spun closer. Fresh, sweet, hot. Sun
on the flowers. Rain on the grass. His mouth watered. Since what happened at Midlands, his senses were sharper
than normal by many orders of magnitude. He had ways to
blunt the overload, but not this time. He was catching a
full data load now, shields and all. Tripping out on her
undulating hand movements. He was reading her energy signature, right through the
shield lenses. A cloud of hot, brilliant colors
surrounded her. Her floating purple veils blended with
trailing clouds of her body’s energy, to which his AVP
overstimulated brain assigned all the colors of the
spectrum and more besides. Colors not visible to anyone
but him. Along with it a strange sensation was growing. Tension,
anticipation. Dread. He was used to being alone in an insulated bubble. Other
people’s drama raged outside that protective barrier and
left him completely untouched. He needed it that way to
stay in control. Maintaining isolation required constant
effort and vigilance. Now, suddenly, he wasn’t alone. The girl had danced
through his force field. Invaded his inner space. It was
messy and crowded in there now. She took up room. Confused him with her colors, her
scents. Her smile was so unforced and sensual. She was
bonelessly flexible, yet still regal in her diaphanous
veils. It made him jittery to have someone so close. The
intimacy felt awkward. Ticklish. He felt hot, red. No control over his face. Stuck here,
sitting among colleagues and family, right next to his
fianceé. Any one of them could watch him watch her. At
least the massive conference table concealed his colossal
hard-on. He had not felt this helpless since Midlands. Her luminous green eyes met his and then flicked away,
but the electric buzz of that split instant of intimacy
jolted him to depths he’d never felt before. He knew he’d never seen this woman before, and yet he
recognized her. **** Caro narrowly missed slamming her hip into the table. For
the third time. Look away from the guy, for God’s sake. Get a grip. It’s
just a dance. But her gaze kept getting sucked back to Noah Gallagher,
the birthday boy. Ultra-powerful CEO of the oh-so-
myserious Angel Enterprises, cutting-edge biotech firm. The man was gorgeous. Barrel chested. A dense slab of
muscle. Short hair showed off the sharp planes and angles
of his face, a wide, strong jaw. He wore shaded glasses,
but he’d taken them off a few seconds into her dance. It
was incredibly hard to stay focused on the music and
remember her moves while being examined with such blazing
intensity. It wiped her mind blank. Made her lose the
thread. To say nothing of her physical balance. Holy flipping wow. They said he was turning thirty-two
today, but he seemed older, or maybe it was just his
expression. Each time she twirled, she snagged a new
yummy detail. The shape of his ears. Thick, straight dark
brows. Sexy grooves framing a stern but still sensual
mouth. Sharp cheekbones. His face was a taut mask of
tension, as if he were suppressing strong emotion. But it
was his eyes that really got to her. His scorching laser focus made her temperature rise.
She’d always been sensitive to the quality of a person’s
energy. Noah Gallagher’s energy dominated the room. He
looked like he’d tear you to pieces if you gave him any
trouble, despite the elegant suit that sat just right on
his huge shoulders. He didn’t laugh or look embarrassed
like most men did when surprised by a belly dancer. He
just sat there, with the charged stillness of a predator
poised to spring. Radiating danger. Her smile faltered as she shimmied and spun. Suddenly,
she was hyper-conscious of the erotic allure of the
dance. His silent, very male sexual energy made it feel
deadly serious. As if they were alone, and she’d been
summoned for a private, uninhibited performance designed
to drive him crazy. Oh my. What a stimulating scenario. She was actually getting aroused. For the love of God.
Rising panic began to shred the sensation. Enough of this
ridiculous crap. She had to get out of here, and fast. Finish the dance. You need the cash. He’s only a hot guy,
not a celestial being. You’re freaking yourself out.
Chill. Usually she spread the wealth, bestowing
flirtatious smiles on everyone. Not tonight. They weren’t
feeling it. Young men were usually always enthusiastic,
and there were several of them here, but no one made a
sound. Tension was thick in the air. No laughter, no
snickering, no whistles. Who cared. Her mind was fully occupied with the task of
not gaping at Noah Gallagher’s godlike hotness. Being
aware of every inch of skin she displayed to him. Her gaze bounced across the blond woman who sat next to
him. A little younger, but not colleague or an assistant.
They sat too close together for that. The woman’s mouth
looked tight and miserable. Next to her sat a flushed,
heavy older man who stared fixedly at Caro’s beaded bra,
nostrils flared. Rise up, cupcake. Take back the power. This was a tough
crowd, maybe, but everything was relative. The people in
this room weren’t trying to frame her for murder, kidnap
her or kill her. And she certainly had the birthday boy’s
full attention. So she’d play with it. What the f**king hell. That man
needed to be humbled. To worship at the feet of her
divine awesomeness. She’d dance like she’d never danced
before, blow his mind, and melt away, forever nameless.
Leaving him to ache and writhe. That’s right, big boy. Prepare to suffer. But Noah Gallagher’s fierce, unwavering gaze was having a
strange effect on her. Ever since she’d gone into hiding,
she’d had a sick, heavy lump in her belly. For months it
had been sitting there, like a chunk of dirty ice that
would not melt. But when she looked at him, that pinched
coldness eased. It turned soft and warm and alive. It felt amazingly good. Dancing for him, she could
actually breathe again. For as long it lasted. The dance was ending. Caro sank to her knees, arching
back in a pose of abandoned sensual ecstasy as the music
reached its climax, luxurious fake hair brushing the
ground in her grand finale. Dancing had never made her
feel so naked before. She was stretched before him like
a sacrificial virgin on an altar. Take me. The pose felt obscene, but only because there were other
people in the room. If there hadn’t been, it would have
felt right. It would have felt . . . hot. The sound of one person frantically clapping broke the
silence. Hannah Gallagher, the girl who had hired her.
Noah Gallagher’s younger sister, from the looks of her.
Caro rose slowly to her feet. Noah Gallagher didn’t
applaud. He just stared at her, as if he wanted to leap
over that table and pin her down. Tension built like an electrical charge. The othe people
in the room looked up, down, anywhere but at her. Caro
smiled brightly. Held her head as high as possible. Not fair, to throw a paid performer into the middle of
someone else’s big fat faux pas and make her swim in it.
Bastards. “That was fabulous!” Hannah’s voice was a little too
high. “Thanks for a gorgeous dance, Shamira! Happy
birthday, Noah! Wasn’t she awesome, everyone?” Not one yes. There was only dead silence, downcast eyes,
awkward looks exchanged all around. And still, Noah
Gallagher’s devouring eyes. So what. She’d stay dignified. While running for her
life, fighting the powers of darkness, scrambling for
money. Even if it involved putting on a scanty costume
and shaking her booty for rude or indifferent strangers. Or, in this case, one single intense, lustful, smoldering
stranger. She took a slow, deliberate bow, as if she were in front
of an adoring crowd. Taking her own sweet time. Rubbing
their faces in it. Take that, you rude shitheads. Like it would kill you to
clap. She didn’t need any validation from these self-important
bio-tech-nerd idiots. Just her fee, which she would get
whether they liked her performance or not. Fuck ’em. She had things to do. Important things. After
one more hungry peek at the mouthwatering godking. Lord,
he was fine. She flash-memorized him in one breathless instant,
whipping her gaze away from his face before eye contact
could start the inevitable sexual mind-melt reaction.
Then she swept out of the room, chin up, shoulders back.
A regal sweep of purple veils. That was it. She would never see him again. She wasn’t
going to feel that hot rush of opening in her chest, ever
again. Suck it up. Ignore the lust buzz. Sport sex is reserved
for normal people. Fugitives do without. And don’t whine. Hannah followed her out of the room, and slammed the door
harder than was necessary. “You were gorgeous,” she said
fervently. “You’re so talented. I’m so sorry they didn’t
clap or anything. I’m going to tell them all off. Noah
will kill me, but I’m used to it.” “I’ll rather not watch that,” Caro said hastily. “I’ll
just be on my way.” “Oh no! Stay just a minute! You have to at least say hi
to Noah. No matter what he says to me, he certainly
enjoyed your dance. I’m the villain here. You’re just an
innocent bystander. Noah’s very fair that way. And I’m
sure he’ll want to meet you!” In your dreams, honey. “Let me, ah, change first,” Caro
said, backing away. “You remember the way to the office? Come back after.
I’ll introduce you.”
The door flew open. A man strode out, not the birthday
boy. This one was tall, blue eyed and very built, his
thick dark blond hair hanging down to his shoulders. His
eyes flicked over her with controlled curiosity and then
turned back to Hannah. “What the hell were you thinking?” he asked. Definitely her cue. Caro took off, hurrying back toward
the nondescript office that’d served as a dressing room.
She didn’t even want to know what Hannah’s answer might
be. Not her family, not her fight. Once inside the empty office, she could still hear them
arguing from behind the door. Other people had gotten
into the mix. Voices were being raised. Her heart pounded
as she peeled off her costume and packed it up. She
pulled on her shapeless street clothing, trying not to
overhear. She had her own problems. Big nasty ones. Time
to cruise discreetly away and let them get on with
theirs. Makeup pads got most of the paint off. She rolled the
expensive dancing wig into its carrying bag, and put on
her street wig, a thick brown bob with heavy bangs and
wisps curling in around her face to conceal its shape.
When she arrived, she hadn’t worn the mouth prosthesis,
which puffed out her cheeks and distorted her jawline.
She’d figured that the coat and hat were enough weirdness
for the client to swallow. But the job was done, and she
hoped to God she could slink out unnoticed, so in went
the mouth thing. Big tinted glasses finished the look,
topped off by her hat with LED lights in the brim,
ordered off the Internet to foil facial recognition
software her pursuers might use to find her on social
media. Who knew if it really worked. At least the wide brim kept
the Seattle drizzle off. Her hands still shook as she pulled on her oversized
black wool coat. The foam lining she’d sewn in bulked up
her shoulders and hips. She looked sixty pounds heavier,
and slightly humped. At first, she’d tried changing the way she moved as part
of her disguise, but after all the bodywork she’d done in
college, she decided that the psychological toll of
slumping and shuffling was dangerous to her soul. Inside
her frumpy cocoon of foam and wool, she still had her
pride and attitude. Hidden, maybe, but structurally
intact. When she exited the office, she looked like a sketch that
had been blurred on purpose. Noah Gallagher would stare
right through her even if she were inches away. That thought was so depressing, she could barely stand to
think it. Chin up. She’d had her fun, turning him on. Time for the
disappearing act. Eat your heart out, Laser Eyes. But disappearing didn’t feel powerful to her. It just
felt flat. Empty and sad. The route back to the elevators took her right past the
conference room. Hannah Gallagher and several others were still arguing
outside it. If she kept her head down, turned the corner
and cut swiftly across the open space, she’d only be in
their line of vision for only a few seconds. Then it was
a straight shot to the elevator. One, two . . . go. When she was squarely in the danger spot, Noah Gallagher
came out the door. That was her undoing. She slowed down. Not consciously,
but simply unable to resist the temptation to steal one
last look at him before fleeing. His gaze snapped onto her, like a powerful magnet
coupling. Oh, God. Oh, no. He strode through the center of the
group, scattering them, and followed her. Even with her
back to him, his eyes burned through her layered, ugly
disguise, a focused point of heat against her concealed
skin. She stabbed the elevator button. He was twenty
yards away. Fifteen, and closing. Picking up speed. He couldn’t have recognized her. In this dreary get-up,
she couldn’t be more different from Shamira the sexy
dancing girl. She barely recognized herself dressed like
this. The door slid open. She lunged inside. No other
riders, thank God.
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