★★★★★ 5
Beauty as an assassin? Yes, please.
Format: Kindle
I am a sucker for Beauty and the Beast retellings, especially when there is fae magic involved.
This story is a stand-alone and can easily be read and enjoyed as such, but the story in the background is waiting to unfold.
Briannis is a lost woman trying to find her place in the world. She happens to be an excellent assassin, but only when there is a good reason behind the job. She runs afoul of the law and is coerced into killing the King of Fae.
Their tale begins with much violence and mistrust. They reach an understanding that turns into more as they are stuck inside the Keep thanks to the murderous roses encasing the building.
Some of my favorite quotes
"This is not very..."
"Proper?" His low drawl curled around her guts, sweet and syrupy. "I thought you'd realise by now that I'm far from a
proper man, Miss Iavi."
She swallowed hard. "You're... you're not making sense. You don't even like me."
"I don't?" he said dryly.
"I tried to kill you! Three times in a row!"
"You may want to leave," he added, barely even moving his lips. His voice was low and raspy, little more than a growl; the words came out with laboured breaths. "Before I no longer let you."
"You can’t just act like you didn’t have your fingers inside me a few hours ago! That’s not something you talk about over strawberries!"
He took a sip of tea. "You’ve had your knife inside me too."
"That," she said exasperatedly, "is something extremely different."
"In the sense that I’d be happy to repeat one incident and not the other, yes." He smiled at her over his teacup, shameless...
"You make a terrible king out of me, Briannis Iavi."
"Are you very sure? There’s no need to be polite if you—"
"I’m not being polite!" A trembling laugh escaped her. "I have no intention at all of being polite to you!"
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Reviewed in the United States on August 25, 2023
