Mean Girls Luv Books: Blog Tour: Eye of the Storm by M. Stratton

Evie Taylor loves her life in Boston, running her bookstore and café, but an accident has made it so she needs to return home to take care of her grandmother. With extra time on her hands, she decides to start looking for the monster that haunts her best friend’s nightmares. A chain of events starts no one could see coming.

When the last person she ever expects shows up and rings her grandmother’s doorbell she finds herself in the middle of danger. Bound together in a common mission, they’ll search the world looking for answers. But can they find them in time or will they end up paying the ultimate price? As the storm rages around them, they find each other, and the calm in the Eye of the Storm.

After dinner, Evie was enjoying a glass of wine while swinging gently in the hammock looking up at the stars. Thinking about the ramifications of Anthony showing up and what that would mean to Lexi and why he hadn’t said anything about her e-mail. There has to be something I can do to help. She would do anything for her family and friends even if it meant working with someone whose face haunted Lexi’s nightmares. It was going to take some work, but she would have to keep Anthony and Jeremy separated. Because she would do anything to help her friend and if she projected Jeremy’s evilness onto Anthony that wouldn’t be good. He was his own man.

Could she really do it? Would he allow her to help? What would it be like to work closely with him? All the different scenarios went through her mind trying to think of every possible angle before forcing him to let her help. It was a shame he was so hot, it sure was going to make things interesting.

Chuckling to herself at what the Troublesome Trio said to Anthony over dinner, she didn’t hear his approach.

“Hello, Evie,” he said while he leaned up against the tree at her feet.

She jumped and almost spilled her wine. “Jesus, wear a fucking bell next time.” She tried to be sly about checking out his arm but when he simply moved his arm so she could get a better look she knew she’d have to get better about checking out if it was him or Jeremy.

“Sorry.” She shrugged. “I have to know it’s you and not him.”

He shoved off of the tree and started pacing. “Do you know what it is like for me? Every time I look in the mirror I know that women looked at this face before they were killed by that bastard. I have people looking at me all the time wondering who it is standing there in front of them. He took people I cared for from me. He took five years of my life from me.”

She couldn’t imagine what it must be like for him; especially knowing Jeremy was out there somewhere waiting to strike. She wanted to comfort him, but had no idea how. “What are you going to do?”

He spun towards her stalking until he was inches from her. “What do you think I’m going to do? Anything and everything I can to end his life. Make him pay for everything he’s taken from me.”

She folded her arms across her chest. “And what? Damn everyone who gets in your way?”

“Precisely.”

“What if you had someone to help you?”

“I don’t need help.”

“Yes, you do. You’re too close to this.”

“And you’re not?”

“Only in the fact this happened to my best friend. I didn’t lose everything you did. I wasn’t attacked two times. I might see something you would miss. You both deserve the peace that comes with knowing this piece of shit is locked up.”

“No.” He turned and started to walk away.

Standing there with her mouth open at the audacity of him she dropped her wine glass in the grass and ended up having to run to catch up with him. She moved to block his way placing a hand on his chest. “Listen, buster, either you let me help you or I will do it on my own, and not share my information with you. You had your chance when I e-mailed you a month ago. I’ve heard nothing since then.”

“What information could you have that I don’t already have?”

“Keep acting like a stubborn mule and you’ll never know what I’ve got. You forget, I have access to all of Noah’s information, and his team has dug up a lot.” She stood there holding her ground hoping he wouldn’t call her bluff. As of right now, she hadn’t exactly seen anything from Noah’s men, but she was hoping he’d let her see everything, especially if Anthony agreed to let her help.

“Why did you come up and talk to me just now? You could have just turned around and I would have never known. You’re seeking me out for some reason. What is it you want?” Evie demanded.

He picked her up and moved her out of the way. She stood there watching him stride towards the cottage never looking back.

Bastard. I’ll show him. She stalked back and picked up the wine glass. Shit. That was my favorite Callaway Sauvignon Blanc wine, too. Picking up the phone in her room, she started making calls.

Alexia Hanson – Melissa Claire Egan
Noah Matthews – Adam Levine
Anthony Maldono – David Gandy
Evelyne Stone – Olympia Dukakis
Leigh Winslow – Julie Christie
Marie Holmes – Faye Dunaway
Evie Taylor – Bianca Balti
Jackson Taylor – Bradley Cooper

The creeptastic series continues. This is the 2nd book of The Storm series. If you have not read the 1st book, After the Storm, do so before reading this one. To my review, follow the following link. Do not keep reading this review, as there are spoilers to book 1.

After the Storm Review

Author M. Stratton again brings us some ultra-disturbing scenes as we follow Anthony and Evie's journey to capture Jeremy. As you'll remember, Jeremy is the serial killer who looks just like Anthony and is stalking and killing the women Anthony has any sort of relationship with. He is set on destroying Anthony's life. Jeremy attacked Lexi and left her for dead. However, she didn't die and ended up sending Anthony to jail by mistake.

Now out of jail, Anthony is following Jeremy's trail. However, it seems like Jeremy is always one step ahead. He decides to go see Lexi hoping that she can remember anything that can help. When he arrives, Lexi is off on her honeymoon with Noah and he is left dealing with Evie, her best friend.

Evie would do anything to help Lexi, so she agrees to help Anthony. It doesn't help that they have an intense pull toward each other. Even though she feels a bit guilty, she wants to pursue their feelings. Despite his feelings, he wants to keep her at a distance. The closer they get, more he tries to push her away. He only wants to keep her safe, but how can he when Jeremy seems to know every move they are going to make?

M. Stratton again creates great characters and delivers a solid story line. She again sucked us into Jeremy's twisted mind. Of course I wanted him to be stopped, so I was routing for Evie and Anthony the whole time. I found the Troublesome Trio a bit much in the 1st book, but I think the author found a good balance this time around where they are concerned. If you enjoy romantic suspense, this is definitely a series for you.

M. Stratton is an International Amazon bestselling author in the romantic suspense and mystery suspense categories for her debut novel After the Storm. She is a self-proclaimed dork that loves to make people laugh and can trip over nothing. Her inner rock star is always on stage performing to a sold out crowd but is quiet and shy on the outside.

She lives with her husband and son in Arizona, which is a big difference from where she grew up north of Chicago Illinois. As an only child she learned to tell herself stories to make the long winters go by quicker while dreaming of summer vacations. Now as an adult she still makes up stories to pass the time, but now she writes them down to share with other people.

When not writing you can find M. watching football (Go Bears!), NASCAR, or classic movies, watching her husband and father restore classic cars, and seeing who can be sillier, her or her son, and of course reading. Things you don’t know about M. Stratton:

1. She loves the movie Twister… she can say all the lines along with the actors. She will also use those lines in real life as often as possible.

2. Halloween is her favorite holiday. She starts planning months in advance. She has more Halloween decorations than Christmas.

3. She once made up a monologue about her love of chocolate chip cookie dough for her high school drama class.

4. There are times she thinks she is so funny she has tears running down her face while laughing at herself.

5. M. can play the clarinet but is in awe of anyone who can play the guitar, piano or drums, pretty much anything where your hands have to do two different things at the same time.

6. Cary Grant is her favorite actor. When she was in high school after Cary Grant died one of the cable stations ran a marathon, she watched his movies from 6 in the morning all day and night until 4 AM the next day.

7. Reading has always been an escape for her. She can devour a book in hours. When she moved in with her husband she literally donated over 1,000 books and saved over 1,000 for herself. She can reread books over and over again if she loves them. There are some that she has reread about once a year for the past 20 years.

8. She eloped after knowing her husband for only two months in 2006. They are still married over seven years later.