Love Hurts by Mandi Beck
Caged Love #1
Publication Date: January 18, 2015
Genres: Contemporary, Romance
Amazon – Nook – iBooks
Synopsis
Even when she won’t fight for us, I’ll go to war for her…
Inside the Octagon, I have no fear. I’m at home, in my element, inflicting pain onto men trained to hurt me just as badly. Making them submit, knocking them out, maiming them, because it’s them or me. And I choose them.
Outside the Octagon, my only weakness is a five-foot-two, classy as fuck woman that I’ve loved for most of my life. She’s the one that brings me to my knees, fills my arms, my heart, and one day soon, my bed. She makes me reckless. Volatile. I drink too much and try too hard to fuck my way out of feeling—all because of her.
Frankie De Rosa is my girl, my best friend. I haven’t earned her yet, but I won’t stand by and let anyone take her from me. She will be the greatest fight of my life, but she’s worth the battle.
Love hurts, but anything worth having does, right?
I’m Deacon “The Hitman” Love — Welcome to the Cage.
Review
Love Hurts had my emotions all over the place from the very first page, and by the end of the text, I was emotionally strung out and mentally exhausted. The whiplash I got at the hands of Deacon Love and his Princess was enough to put a permanent kink in my neck. I was cursing both of them on numerous occasions, and I wanted to reach into my iPad and shake some sense into both of them.
This text epitomizes the word ANGST, which makes it an extremely frustrating read, but it also illustrates the flawless writing of Mandi Beck. She allows readers to feel every emotion that both Deacon and Frankie go through as they transition from best friends to lovers and the repercussions of that evolution in their relationship.
Nothing is easy when it comes to the kind of love that Deacon and Frankie share; it’s all consuming, which leads to an almost obsessive need to be together, but those same out of control feelings can also lead to catastrophe and alienate them just as easy as strengthen them. Every feeling is amplified when it comes to the power they have over each other, which means when one of them fucks up, the hurt is too much to bear, and there is a lot of messed up situations in Deacon and Frankie’s relationship as the book progresses.
Deacon Love is an extremely dynamic character; there are so many sides to his personality that I don’t think readers will ever get to the core of who he is. He’s quick tempered…passionate…fiery…unpredictable…filthy mouthed…cocky. He has a plethora of personality traits that are contradictory, which makes him flawed but lovable. His love for Frankie is both a blessing and a curse because it both heals and scars him, mostly due to his idiotic decisions and actions, especially the ones he makes due to his male appendage. But through all of the missteps, there’s no denying the fact that he was made to love his Princess…now he just has to prove to Frankie that he’s worth the hurt.
Francesca “Frankie” De Rosa is just as much of a fighter as Deacon is, which is an absolute necessity due to the hellish events she faces in the text. It’s hard to truly wrap my head around all that makes Frankie who she is because readers don’t get a lot of her perspective, but what we do get points to a woman who is fierce and loyal to her soul.
There’s a lot at stake for Deacon and Frankie, both personally and as a couple, and with the way book one ended, the stakes are going to be even higher in book two, which, for me, means I’m going to have to take a Xanax to get through it;
Mandi Beck’s debut story is a beautiful crafted text that illustrates how much loving someone unequivocally can be both someone’s undoing and his/her redemption. It’s unclear at this point which category Deacon and Frankie will end up being in, but it is clear that neither are done fighting for and with each other.
Love hurts but it also heals…let’s hope it does the latter as Deacon and Frankie’s story continues.
A complimentary copy was provided in exchange for an honest review.
4.5 poison apples
Excerpt
Standing off to the side of the stage waiting for them to call my name, I search the crowd for Frankie. She’s here with Guy somewhere. Knowing him, they’re in the front row or close to it. Finally spotting them, I just watch and wait for her to feel me looking at her. I hadn’t been sure if she was going to be here tonight, since I didn’t see her after we got to the gym this morning. She had her class and I had my asshole brothers riding my ass for being late. I’d meant to ask her, but I’m so used to Frankie just being at these things anyways it slipped my mind. This relationship shit is fucking tricky. I’ve never been in one, so she has a lot to teach my slow ass. Letting my eyes travel over her, I can feel my cock getting heavy. Great, just what I fucking need before I drop trou in front of thousands of people. Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been semi hard getting weighed in, but if I’m not careful, I’ll be sporting full wood. Adjusting myself in my track pants, I just stare at my girl. She’s changed out of her “Hitman” shirt. Her hair is down and wavy, the lights in the auditorium casting a halo over the long, platinum strands. She has on this low-cut, white top that I’m pretty sure is lace underneath a black blazer with the sleeves rolled up revealing her delicate wrists covered in bracelets. I can see that she has on jeans, but I can’t tell what she has on her feet, but I know I’m gonna want to fuck her in nothing but whatever they are later. All of a sudden I’ve developed a fucking shoe fetish. This train of thought isn’t helping with my hard on even a little bit. Making my way back up to her face, our eyes meet. I mouth, “You look hot as fuck,” winking at her.
The smile that spreads across her face is contagious, and before I know it, I’m standing there like an asshole, hand on my cock and a dopey fucking smile on my face. Shaking my head at myself, I chuckle and give her my, “You’re so getting fucked later” smirk before turning away to listen to what my pop and Sonny are saying to me.
When the emcee calls my name, the room explodes into applause, catcalls, and screaming. Smiling and waving as I step onto the stage with Mav, I nod at the men waiting to weigh me in and pose me with Tamasino for the pictures, completely ignoring the bikini-clad chicks lining the wall. I’ve fucked too many of the ring girls here to feel comfortable even making eye contact with any of them knowing Frankie’s in the same room. Standing to the side of the scale, I toe off my shoes and bend to yank off my socks, handing them to Mav before giving him my hat and “Just the Tip” shirt, leaving my pants for last since I’m still more than semi hard. Once I’m down to nothing but my black boxer briefs, my hard on, and my ink, I take a deep breath and step onto the scale. Being a heavyweight fighter, I have to stay under 265, which isn’t a problem for me, but it’s all still pretty nerve wracking.
“Two hundred and forty pounds,” the guy manning the scale announces.
Flexing once for the cameras, I hop off the scale and go over to where Mav is holding my clothes to wait on Tam to get weighed. Leaving my shirt off for the pictures with Tamasino, I look over to see Mav looking at me in amusement.
“What?”
“Way to rock out with your cock out, Deac.”
About the Author
Mandi Beck has been an avid reader all of her life. A deep love for books always had her jotting down little stories on napkins, notebooks, and her hand. As an adult she was further submerged into the book world through book clubs and the epicness of social media. It was then that she graduated to writing her stories on her phone and then finally on a proper computer.
A nursing student, mother to two rambunctious and somewhat rotten boys, and stepmom to two great girls away at college, she shares her time with her husband in Chicago where she was born and raised. Mandi is a diehard hockey fan and blames the Blackhawks when her deadlines are not met.
Love Hurts is her debut novel and she is currently working on the next in the series along with whatever other voices are clamoring for attention in her mind.
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