Guarded by the Snake by Layla Fae
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
She stole her way into my cold, serpent heart like a thief in the night.
Guarded by the Snake
The tiny human hires me to shield her from the vengeance of a powerful organization. There’s nothing wrong with that, except she stole from them, got caught, and now I have to clean up her mess. Add to that her incessant chatter, and I’m in for the most unpleasant job in my career.
Until her enemies bring out the big guns, turning the irksome protection assignment into a lethal fight for survival. Necessity pushes my principal closer and closer—too close for comfort. Forced to hide in small spaces, her skin rubbing against my scales, her warm breath on my face, my exasperation gives way to lust.
It’s just physical attraction, I tell myself. All I want is to bury my two spikes in her tight body and feel her writhing under me in pleasure. Nothing more than that. Because it’s impossible I could want her–the annoying, ballsy little thief who makes the sun shine with a smile.
One thing is certain: this is no longer just a job. I’ll butcher everyone who wants to hurt her.
Monster Security Agency is the most elite bodyguard service in the world. These monster bodyguards are lethal, powerful, and determined to protect their clients at all costs. They shouldn’t fall in love with their principals, but if they do? Things are bound to explode.
Super steamy monster sex with a great story!
The following ratings are out of 5:
Romance: 💚🖤❤️💜🩵
Heat/Steam: 🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
Story/Plot: 📕📗📙📘📔
World building: 🌏🌍🌎🌏🌍
Character development: ☹️☺️😊🥰😍
The Hero: Asan – he is a sherhu, which is not a snake, he is humanoid on his top half and snakelike on the bottom half. Though he moved like a snake, he wore clothing to make him look more presentable and less monstrous. He worked for the Monster Security Agency, taking on dangerous missions as a bodyguard whenever he could. This time he took a job that he wanted to get done with quickly since it was nearly time for him to molt and he liked to spend a lot of that time in the pool under the agency. He is hired to protect Kim Schmidt.
The heroine: Kim – she is a human girl with no digital footprint or online presence. She has no social media, no school records, no relatives, and no address on file, though her drivers license checks out. Kim is a thief, and she bungled her last job, and the victim of her crime is now after her. He is Maximillian Rossi, the owner of Vanguard Cybersystems, and he is one of the most powerful people in Los Angeles.
The story: Asan doesn’t want the job because he has no respect for someone who would be so arrogant and incompetent to think they could go up against one of the most high-tech cybersecurity companies in the world. Since Kim messed up the job, he knew she had high expectations for herself and thought she was better than she actually was. He disliked working for people like that and was inclined to turn down the job. Clients like that often thought they knew better than everyone else and did what they wanted which often landed them in hot water. Though he took the job because he new that he would do a better job than some of the other agents and he would feel guilty if an of them were killed because he turned down a job.
“Spending time in her company, twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, would be an ordeal. My head already hurt at the amount of effort it would take me to remain professional. Getting shot at on the job? Easy. Eliminating threats and losing tails? Sign me up.
But being stuck with someone you had no respect for and couldn’t trust? Fuck. This. Shit.”
I have to admit that I went into this one not knowing at all what to expect. I just finished reading book 8 in this same series, Guarded by a Nightmare and was very impressed with that book, especially because it was so original, and the monster was a kind I had never heard of before and he had some cool powers. A different author wrote this one, though I had also just recently read a book by Layla Fae that I liked quite a bit. So, I figured I would give it a try.
I have read quite a bit of alien and monster romance so I have read some books before where the Hero is a Naga (snake man), so I figured this one would be similar. Though I was a bit worried by the disclaimer at the beginning of the book that said, “Please, suspend your disbelief while reading chapter 15, chapter 16, chapter 19, chapter 20, chapter 21, chapter 25, chapter 26, and chapter 27. If you need a logical explanation for why the puzzle pieces that have no business fitting together actually fit, it’s provided later in the book.” Though that also had my interest piqued a bit.
The storyline about Rossi trying to get Kim and the statue she stole from him was a good one, there was plenty of suspense, intrigue and action. The intimate scenes were steamy, and I won’t get into it anymore than that. There was also a side storyline about their “interspecies” relationship. This was set in a world where monsters were well known to humans and accepted in society, but the idea of a sherhru and a human relationship was not at all accepted by either race. Asan didn’t even know if the two species were compatible at the beginning of the book. He didn’t even want to imagine it until he started to have feelings for Kim, and others made it known to them that it was not acceptable.
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