Protecting Maggie by Susan Stoker

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

A virgin, a convict, and a villain who is determined to destroy them both.

Imprisoned for a crime she didn’t commit, Maggie Lionetti is doing everything she can to keep her head above water. Including using a friend’s name and her car to make money. Too bad she crosses paths with someone who actually knows her friend…and knows she isn’t who she’s pretending to be.

Shawn “Preacher” Franklin isn’t about to let someone cheat and steal from a Navy friend while she’s deployed. So he and his friends confront Maggie, and find out she’s simply a woman down on her luck. There’s something about her, and her situation, that strikes a chord in him and he begins helping her get back on her feet.

One thing leads to another and before they know it, Maggie and Preacher are dating. It’s an unusual match, the virgin and the convict, but it works. They work.

But not everyone who puts on a uniform for their country does so for the right reasons. Maggie’s keeping a secret from her new boyfriend and his friends. A secret that could put her right back in prison and be deadly for Preacher and his fellow Navy SEALs. She has to find the courage to spill all her secrets…but that still might not be enough to save her.

Protecting Maggie

Preacher and the convict

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

Characters & Plot Summary

I went into this one not expecting to fall as hard as I did for these two. Maggie Lionetti has had the worst luck imaginable. She served time for a crime she didn’t even commit, and when she finally got out, being a felon meant nobody would hire her. Her friend Adina took her in and even let her drive her car while she was deployed, which is where things get messy. Maggie ends up using Adina’s name and car just to survive, and that’s exactly what catches the attention of Shawn “Preacher” Franklin and his SEAL team. They think someone is stealing from a fellow service member, so they confront her, only to realize she’s not a con artist at all, just a woman who’s been dealt a terrible hand.

What got me was how quickly Preacher looks past the situation and sees her. He starts helping her get back on her feet, and that slow build from suspicion to genuine care turned into a real relationship before either of them fully realized it. The twist I wasn’t expecting is that Preacher, not Maggie, is the virgin in this story. I loved that detail because it’s rare to see a grown, capable military hero portrayed that way, and Stoker doesn’t make it awkward or played for a joke. It’s tied to his belief in real love, and it made me respect him more, not less.

Of course nothing can be simple. Maggie is hiding a secret that could send her right back to prison and put Preacher and his team in serious danger, and once that secret starts unraveling, the story shifts into a tense standoff against a villain with more power and connections than I thought the team could handle.

Highlights & Limitations

The villain in this book genuinely rattled me. I’ve read a few of Stoker’s books at this point and this guy might be the most unsettling one yet. He’s not just physically threatening, he has influence and watching the team realize how many people he had in his pocket made me nervous for characters I’d already grown attached to. There’s a subplot involving a character named MacGyver that completely caught me off guard emotionally. I won’t spoil what happens, but I had a lump in my throat during that section, and I’m already looking forward to seeing where his story goes in a future book.

Where I found myself wishing for a little more was the pacing in the middle third. Once Maggie and Preacher’s relationship settles into place, there’s a stretch where I wanted the suspense plot to pick up faster. I understand Stoker was building toward the reveal, but I found myself wanting to skip ahead a little to get back to the danger, since that’s where the book is at its strongest.

What really works is how grounded Maggie feels. She’s not written as a damsel who needs saving in every scene. Her desperation for connection after years of having no one in her corner comes through clearly, and it’s what made me root for her from the start. When she finally starts opening up to Preacher about her past, it doesn’t feel rushed or convenient, it feels earned.

Narration & Performance

Emma Wilder voices Maggie and she captures that guarded, worn down quality perfectly without ever making her sound weak. You can hear the walls coming down bit by bit as the story goes on, and by the time Maggie starts trusting Preacher fully, Wilder’s performance sells every bit of that shift.

Ryan West as Preacher is exactly what I want from a SEAL hero narrator. He’s steady and commanding in the action scenes, but he also nails the softer, almost bashful moments, especially anything touching on his inexperience. I actually laughed out loud at his reaction the first-time things get physical with Maggie, because West plays it with such genuine, unguarded surprise that it felt real instead of cartoonish. Together, the two narrators keep the tension between Maggie and Preacher feeling natural, and the shift into thriller territory during the villain’s scenes comes through with real weight in West’s delivery especially.

Final Opinion

I loved this one more than I expected to going in. Maggie and Preacher’s relationship is the kind of slow, earned connection that makes a romance feel worth investing in, and the suspense plot, even with a slower stretch in the middle, pays off with a villain who actually feels dangerous. The MacGyver subplot alone is going to stick with me for a while, and I’m already planning to pick up whatever book tells his story. If you enjoy military romance with real emotional stakes and a couple who feel like actual people instead of tropes, this one is worth your credits.

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