Naomi's Reading Palace: Review - Up To Me by M. Leighton

It is release week for Up To Me, and I was lucky enough to snag a review copy of the book from the author M. Leighton!! Here is my review and a few quotes!!

Title: Up To Me

Author: M. Leighton

Series: The Bad Boys #2

Genre: Adult Contemporary Romance

Published: January 6^th 2013

For readers 18+

The Blurb

Happily ever after doesn’t come easy. But for love, it’s always worth the fight.

Olivia finds bliss unlike any she’s ever known in Cash’s arms. He sets her skin on fire and melts her heart right inside her chest. Unfortunately, their happily ever after is short-lived when a shadow from Cash’s past threatens to turn their world upside down.

Dangerous people from his father’s world have discovered that Cash holds information that could put them away for a very long time. And they’re willing to do anything—and hurt anybody—to get it back. Giving it up means Cash must choose between the life of his father and the life of Olivia.

Having nearly overcome her wariness of bad boys, Olivia’s trust is shaken when this new threat arises. Now she finds that Cash is not only a danger to her heart, but his family has associations that are a danger to her life as well. She soon discovers that there are some situations in life where trust is a girl’s only option. And this is one of them. If she’s to live, she must trust Cash with her life. But to Olivia, that’s much, much easier than letting go and trusting him with her heart.

My Review

Where to start…. Down To You was a fun book mostly, with Olivia juggling the ‘twins’ but the story turned serious in the end when Cash explained some of his secrets to Olivia as she was beginning to figure things out. Up To Me was more intense as we are dealing with those secrets and the consequences of Cash’s fathers’ actions. I’m not going to explain too much as there are a lot more secrets that are revealed in Up To Me and the plot takes some unexpected twists.

Up To Me continues where Down To You left off, after Cash and Olivia welcome each other home, they go to work at the club, doing their best to keep their relationship professional. Taryn is being unusually nice to Olivia and Marissa takes an unexpected appearance after the club closes. Cash cracks me up a lot and after Marissa turns up he thinks to himself,

My hard-on isn’t a problem anymore; the sound of Marissa’s voice took care of that. In fact, it almost gave me a damned vagina.

I was laughing out loud at that statement, Cash has the best lines!!

Olivia is still the same girl as she was in the first book and it doesn’t take long for her to second guess herself. One little conversation with Taryn and all Cash’s hard work has gone out the window. I wanted to jump in there and give her a piece of my mind!! Lucky Cash has those magic fingers and lips and it wasn’t long before she forgot all those fears!!

I am going to give away a little bit of the story here, but Marissa is abducted from the home she shares with Olivia. As a result, Cash has to make a trip to visit his Father. In their cryptic conversation, Cash has to place two ad’s in the paper so that two associates will contact Cash and they may be able to get him out of this situation. When I found out who the first mysterious person was, my stomach nearly dropped to the floor!! I was in shock!! I really felt for Cash too as he has had to live with these secrets for 7 years when things could’ve been different. It was a massive twist I didn’t see coming, but it definitely spiced up the plot!!

We also meet Gavin, Cash’s best friend and part-time bar manager, who has a touch of an Aussie accent from living there during his childhood. And as Olivia describes him,

Holy furry crap balls! He’s gorgeous!

Being a fellow Aussie myself, it is fun to see another Aussie in a book, using words like mate and sheila, although, I can’t remember the last time I heard the word sheila here in Australia!!

“Stop walking so fast, you crazy foreigner!” I mutter.

In front of me, Gavin tips his head back and loud whispers up into the night, “Walk faster, psycho sheila.”

He likes to chat up the ladies and does a great job of chatting with Olivia until Cash steps in, but Gavin is also someone who can flip a switch and be the cold hearted person you would never want to cross in a dark alley. He is mysterious and distant, but loyal to Cash. They make a fierce pair!

Olivia and Cash’s relationship becomes stronger as they face each hurdle in this book. Olivia still has doubts about the bad boy, but Cash is determined to get her to see the person he truly is. And OMG! The steamy sex scenes…. Definite panty wetters there!! They make an amazing couple and know what they both need when it comes to the bedroom, or other rooms, as it were……

Again, I found Michelle’s writing captivating and it was hard to stop reading once I started. I highlighted over 40 lines or paragraphs in this book, funny lines and swoon paragraphs, anything I found amusing! The plot was powerful and I had to see what happened next and I was again surprised as to how it all turned out. I’m looking forward to the next book, as things have become very interesting!!

You can find my review for Down To You, book 1 in The Bad Boys series here.

About the Author

M. Leighton is a native of Ohio, but she relocated to the warmer climates of the South, where she can be near the water all summer and miss the snow all winter. Possessed of an overactive imagination from early in her childhood, Michelle finally found an acceptable outlet for her fantastical visions: writing fiction. Thirteen of Michelle's novels can now be found on Amazon, as well as several other sites. She's currently working on sequels, though her mind continues to churn out new ideas, exciting plots and quirky characters. Pick one up and enjoy a wild ride through the twists and turns of her vivid imagination.

About Michelle: I love coffee and chocolate, even more so when they are combined. I'm convinced that one day they could be the basis for world peace. I also love the color red and am seriously considering dying my hair.

You can find M. Leighton online-