Review: Riding Wild by Jaci Burton

This first story in the Wild Riders series introduces you to the Wild Riders organization. This covert group of professional operatives work to right wrongs in situations where traditional law enforcement cannot be involved because of media attention and bureaucracy. Of course, they're all alpha males/bad boys who break all the rules.

In Riding Wild, Lilly is part of the traditional law enforcement corps, now working for a private investigator. Hired to "test" the security at a museum, Lilly witnesses someone else breaking in and stealing an artifact. Intent on stopping the theft, she comes face-to-face with her first lover, A Harley-riding hunk who had broken her teenage heart.

It should have been a fairly easy mission for Mac. Get in. Get the artifact. Get out. Deliver it. Then he's detained by a gun-wielding ghost from his past. A woman very different from the girl who has haunted his dreams for the past ten years. Both struggle to control the situation and he prevails, taking her hostage because, really, he has no choice. He can't leave her there to call in the troops.

Burton takes us on a ride from Chicago to Dallas, through the fun of a biker rally, through a game of chicken between Lilly and Mac as she tries to escape, to Dallas where they confront her father and the history that tore them apart.

Mac is a wonderful hero. He's typical male, always right, always knowing better than his female counterpart, usually making some bad decisions in his effort to protect her. But he's not without brains and he's not without compassion and empathy. Mac experiences an epiphany when he realizes he has been very much like her father -- deciding what is best for Lilly, not allowing her to make her own choices.

Lilly is a strong heroine. She's smart and she's stubborn. Growing a spine since high school, choosing a career in law enforcement and far away from her father's socialite lawyer plans for her life, Lilly lets Mac know she's not a wimpy, whiny spoiled rich girl. Well, except when he uses sex to control her (or maybe he just can't resist her?). In Lilly's own words, "What was it about him that made her IQ drop a hundred points and turned her into a quivering mass of bimbo?"

Thankfully, Jaci Burton has teamed up with Berkley's Heat Division. I've often found that when an author produces great romps within the page limits of Ellora's Cave or Samhain Publishing, they really shine when allowed enough room to develop the plot and the characters. Burton is no exception.

Riding Wild is filled with several scenes showing Mac and Lilly's passion for one another, but it also has a good plot. A plot that is eerily like a paranoid thought I've long had about computers and certain software developers. I'm not telling because I don't want to spoil it for you. This is a really fun ride! '-D