Protecting Josie by Susan Stoker

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

One fateful decision turned into the scariest moment of her life…but it also led her to him.

Josie couldn’t believe she was a prisoner of war. Not that she was in the military, or that they were at war, but she’d been thrown into a cell and left to die all the same. And she was going to die. Of that she was certain. Until a real-life hero was thrown into the cell next to hers.

Navy SEAL Nate “Blink” Davis couldn’t believe he was on another mission that had gone sideways. At least this time no one had died. He had no doubt his team would break him out, he just had to be patient. But when he realized he wasn’t alone in the dark dank prison, his entire world shifted.

The woman in the cell next to him was in bad shape. And he wasn’t going to leave her. It wasn’t even an option. However, like the SEAL motto, The Only Easy Day Was Yesterday, Blink and Josie would find out exactly how true that was when they got back to the “real world” and realized their troubles were only starting.

Protecting Josie

Finding Light in the Darkest Place

The following ratings are out of 5:
Romance: 💙💛💚❤️
Spice: 🌶️🌶️🌶️
Chemistry: 🧪🧪🧪🧪
Story/Plot: 📕📗📘📙📔
World building: 🌏🌍🌎🌏🌎
Character development: 😋🙂😁😘🥰
Narrator(s): 🎙🎙🎙🎙🎙
Narration type: Dual Narration

Character Backgrounds and Plot Summary

Nate “Blink” Davis has been carrying the weight of survivor’s guilt ever since a mission left him as the only member of his team still alive. When he volunteers for another operation in the same dangerous region, it feels as much like a personal reckoning as a military assignment. The mission goes horribly wrong, and Blink ends up imprisoned in an Iranian jail, where he discovers he is not alone.

Josie England never expected that flying to Kuwait to break up with her boyfriend would end with her being beaten, imprisoned, and abandoned in a foreign prison. By the time Blink is thrown into the neighboring cell, she has almost given up hope. One of my favorite parts of the story was how their relationship begins with the smallest acts of kindness instead of dramatic declarations. Josie, despite barely having enough to survive herself, shares the precious water she has collected from a slow leak in her cell with Blink. In return, Blink keeps talking to her when she has almost lost the ability to speak, refusing to let her disappear into despair. Their connection grows through compassion, determination, and the simple promise that he will not leave without her.

Highlights and Limitations

This book is much heavier than the earlier books in the series, and I appreciated that Susan Stoker let the emotional trauma linger instead of magically fixing everything once the rescue was over. The prison scenes were difficult to read at times, but they made Blink’s fierce determination to save Josie feel completely earned. I especially liked that he started calling her “Spirit” because he recognized how hard she was fighting to survive even when she thought she had nothing left.

The rescue itself delivers plenty of suspense, but I was actually more invested in what happened afterward. Both characters have to process everything they endured, and their healing feels just as important as escaping captivity. I also enjoyed seeing the Alliance team rally around them instead of pretending they could recover on their own.

The one aspect I wished had been explored a little more was the antagonists after the escape. The emotional conflict between Blink and Josie was so compelling that the villains felt less memorable by comparison. Even so, that was a fairly minor issue because the focus remained where I wanted it, on two traumatized people slowly finding hope again.

Narration

Samantha Brentmoor does an excellent job bringing Josie’s vulnerability to life without making her sound weak. During the early prison chapters, when Josie can barely communicate, Brentmoor relies on subtle emotion rather than exaggerated performances, which made those scenes especially moving.

Robert Hatchet captures Blink’s quiet strength and protective nature very well. He never overplays the tough military persona, allowing Blink’s concern for Josie and the guilt he carries over his lost teammates to come through naturally. Together, the dual narration made it easy to distinguish each perspective, and both narrators handled the tense action scenes and emotional conversations with equal confidence.

Final Opinion

This ended up being one of my favorite books in the SEAL of Protection: Alliance series because it felt more emotionally grounded than a typical rescue romance. Blink and Josie do not fall in love because they are thrown together. They fall in love because they repeatedly choose each other in the darkest circumstances imaginable. The image that stayed with me long after I finished was Josie giving away the little water she had managed to collect, and Blink refusing to abandon her no matter what it would cost him. Those moments defined who they were far more than any action sequence.

If you enjoy military romance with high stakes, intense survival scenes, and characters who earn their happily ever after through resilience and unwavering loyalty, I think this audiobook is well worth your time.

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