Series: Texas Justice (Book 2)
She’s no one’s second choice ...
Slater Highwater had his own reasons for coming home to
Last Stand, Texas. And if anyone wants to know why a guy with a philosophy
degree from an Ivy League school was now running the historic Last Stand
Saloon, he has a stack of ready answers, none of which are completely true.
But Joey Douglas never asked that question. Perhaps
because she and Slater are always carrying on conversations no one else can
follow. Or perhaps because she suspects she knows why he came home – her
glamorous and calculating older sister broke his heart.
Joey has longed for Slater since she first laid eyes on
him, but her sister will always be an insurmountable barrier between them. Sure
she and Slater click intellectually and sparks ignite whenever they’re in the
same room, but Joey will never, ever settle for being Slater’s consolation
prize no matter how much she loves him.
Can Joey step out of her sister's shadow? Can Slater
convince Joey she's his true soul mate?
I loved the first book in this series, Lone Star Lawman,
and this one was just as good. In that first book, I was intrigued by Slater.
Something told me that there was more to him than first appeared, and I was
right. Slater is the second oldest brother. He runs the family bar instead of
being in law enforcement like his brothers Shane and Sean. Slater returned to
Last Stand after graduating from Harvard with a philosophy degree and ending
his engagement with his fiancée Diandra. He never says why he came back, just
lets people make whatever assumptions they want to make. The only person who
hasn't asked why he came back was Joey.
Joey is the town's assistant librarian. She is sweet,
king, big-hearted, and has a sassy side that not many people see. She has loved
Slater since she was a teenager and he was dating, then engaged to her older
sister. They had a good friendship going, as Joey was the only person in town
who could keep up with Slater's conversational twists and turns.
I loved the development of the relationship between
Slater and Joey. They were friends for a long time, even after the end of
Slater's engagement to her sister. Slater didn't see her as anything but
Diandra's little sister until one night that he saw her playing pool at the bar.
Suddenly he saw her in a whole new way and it kind of freaked him out a bit at
first. It was fun to see his mental gyrations as he found himself more and more
distracted by her. The more time that he spent with her, the more he realized
the depth of his mistake with her sister. It was sweet to see his growing
interest in Joey and how well he understood her. I loved the hang-gliding scene
and how he knew precisely how to encourage her.
Joey was surprised by Slater's growing attention. She was
used to blending into the background, the plain, nerdy sister when compared to
Diandra. As Slater continues to pay attention to her, she finds it harder and
harder to keep her distance.
There was so much that Joey and Slater had going for them.
Both of them are highly intelligent with an affinity for the written word. I
loved seeing them trade quotations the way that other people trade quips. Both tend
to lose themselves in thought, zoning out while the world goes on around them. They
also have some significant issues that keep them apart. Slater is drowning in
the guilt he feels over staying in college after their parents died, leaving
Shane to carry the load of taking care of the family. That guilt shows up in
the form of doing everything he can to antagonize Shane. He is so down on
himself that he has trouble believing that anyone would want him, something
that was reinforced by Diandra's treatment of him. Joey suffers from some
serious lack of confidence in her appeal to men. She thinks that she would be a
"consolation prize" to anyone who had been interested in her sister. Though
neither could see their own appeal, each one could see what the other was
suffering. I loved how Joey gave Slater the ability to see his issue from a
different viewpoint. Slater won my heart when he realized what made Joey hold
back and was so determined to show her that his feelings for her were real. His
method was so romantic and showed how well he understood her. There was an especially satisfying scene at
the end that showed that the past no longer had a hold on either of them.
I loved getting more insight into the Hightower family.
The relationship between Slater and Shane is still a difficult one for most of
the book. There are hints of the lessening of hostilities as we see Slater's
reactions to Lily being part of Shane's life now. I loved finding out the cause
of the tension between them and how Joey's influence brought an end to it. There
was also more about Kane, the missing Hightower brother. Joey's understanding
of the pain they were all in, especially Sage's pain, brought back a memory
that gave her and Slater a lead in the search for what happened to him. My
heart ached for them all as Joey and Slater pursued that lead. I can't wait for
the next book to see where the search goes next.
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