Justice by Bailey Bradford

4906867 Title: Justice

Author:  Bailey Bradford

Genre:  Gay/Paranormal/Shifters

Length:  Novella (145 Pages)

Publisher:  Total-E-Bound Publishing (October 4th, 2013)

Heat Level:  Moderate

Heart Rating: ♥♥♥♥ 4 Hearts

Reviewer:  Laurie

Blurb:  Recovering from his past might cost Paul Hardy his life. 

Paul Hardy has been rescued from a human trafficking ring, but he isn’t free. The experience has left him traumatized and unable to dig himself out of his past. He’s learned things no one ever should—including that shifters exist and are every bit as vicious as the beasts they become. 

Snow leopard shifter Justice Chalmers spent ten years in the Marines before moving back to Phoenix and working hard to get his dream job. Being a cop is all he’s ever wanted. When his younger sister needs someone to drive her to their Grandma Marybeth’s place in Colorado so she can try to help a human man with her new therapy license, Justice steps up to help her out, never imagining that he’ll meet his mate. 

Justice and Paul won’t have it easy. Not only does Paul have serious issues from his ordeal, his fear of shifters makes him a leery mate. 

And someone wants to silence him permanently…

Reader Advisory: This book contains reference to past sexual abuse.

Purchase Link: http://www.total-e-bound.com/product.asp?strParents=&CAT_ID=&P_ID=2330

Review:  In this story, the author deals with the aftermath of sexual abuse, showing that any person can need some help at some point in their lives. While Paul wasn’t necessarily a very easy character to like, you did understand what had made him the way he became. Bailey gives you a very real and gritty look at the physical and psychological changes that a person goes through to deal with long-term abuse. I loved that she had someone there to help Paul, someone who had his or her own issues to deal with.  Life is messy but can be dealt with when you have lots of love and people who care.

Paul thinks he’s dealt with or is dealing with what has happened to him. If he’s in constant control of the sex, then he’s not a victim anymore. Except he’s not dealing with it, he’s just existing from day-to-day, taking no joy from anything left in his life. Not even the sex. Putting himself in danger for sex that he doesn’t even enjoy, and getting lax in the precautions he’s taken, he realizes that maybe he does need the help his brother, Preston says he does. When his past abuse catches up with him in the form of the wolf shifters, he escaped from, he’s in more trouble and now he knows it.

Justice is an officer of the law and a snow leopard shifter who just happens to live in Phoenix. When his sister who’s just gotten her degree in psychology is asked to help the brother of one of their long-lost relatives, well you can’t say no to family. And asked to drive her to help Paul, since because of her own drama, Justice does.

The road to love and a happy ever after is going to be long and painful for both Paul and Justice.  Paul has to work through his disengagement of feelings and need for control in sex. And he needs to deal with his fear of shifters, since Justice is one and his mate. Justice needs to stay patience and be there for Paul.

In the mix of all this is the relative who’s mated to a wolf, which Paul still has an uncontrollable fear of. Add a Shaman, who is hunting down the shifters who kidnapped and abused Paul, long-lost relatives and Grandma Marybeth, who is a feisty hoot in all of these Leopard Spot books.

This is book ten, and these do need to be read in order to understand the background and the building of the relationships.