Review – Deadly Dance by Dee Davis

Publisher: Grand Central
Publish Date: Out Now!
How I got this book: NetGalley

As the intelligence officer for A-Tac, a black-ops CIA unit masquerading as Ivy League faculty, Hannah Marshall is used to working behind the scenes. But when a brutal murder hits too close to home, Hannah finds herself in the middle of the action, falling in love while racing to outwit a sadistic mastermind.

A KILLER CLOSES IN
After the death of her A-Tac partner, Hannah doubts everything she thought she knew about love and loyalty. When handsome Harrison Blake joins the team, she’s reluctant to trust him – or to act on her intense attraction to him. Then Hannah receives a podcast of a gruesome murder, and the only person who can help her find the killer is Harrison.

Harrison has spent years trying to hunt down the cunning monster who killed his sister. Now investigating with Hannah, he faces a shocking possibility – his sister’s murderer has resurfaced. As the danger escalates, Hannah and Harrison grow closer, the desire simmering between them ignites. And when Hannah disappears, Harrison has only one chance to save the woman he loves.
*Blurb from Goodreads*

When I first picked up Dee Davis, I really enjoyed the different set-up she created for her characters. I’ve never read a book with undercover operatives working as professors, and I have to say I liked it. I liked it a lot. But for some reason, in this book, it didn’t work for me as much as before.

Hannah has been a little down and out since the death of her best friend and fellow A-Tac agent. But with her latest case she has been working closely with Harrison, the newest member of their team and man who keeps drawing Hannah’s attention. Not only is this case eerily similar to the one that killed Harrison’s sister, but the killer seems to be targeting women close to Hannah.

As clues as revealed and more women are killed, Hannah and Harrison get closer to not only finding the truth, but to falling in love with one another. When the killer eventually gets Hannah in his clutches, Harrison will have to face one of his worst nightmares in order to get her back.

Like I said before, while I originally really enjoyed the undercover aspect in previous books, in didn’t work for me in this one. I’m not sure if it’s because the A-Tac team were working a case on their own undercover college campus, or what, but I found myself getting frustrated a few times while reading. Time and time again Hannah and Harrison were told they needed to remain undercover, that they couldn’t act like CIA agents, instead had to maintain their professor personas. However, throughout the entire book they ran the investigation, questions witnesses (their own students), gave out confidential information and generally ran around and acted like CIA agents. At no point in the book did any of the characters act like they were undercover, and yet for some reason, NO ONE seemed to question their involvement within the case. To me, that just seemed not only really unlikely, but also outside of the realm of believable for me.

That aside, there were things I really enjoyed about this book. Like the other A-Tac books, the Consortium is working hard to undermine them in any and every way possible. I liked the twist at the end of the book between the Consortium and the serial killer and how it all ended up working out. It was something I didn’t catch onto until about halfway through, and was a great way to tie the whole book together.

The relationship between Hannah and Harrison ran somewhat hot and cold for me. There were moments when the two of them seemed so connected and wonderful together, and then other moments when I couldn’t really feel their passion for each other. I did like that they complemented each other well, they were both big fans of technology and were perfect for bouncing ideas off each other. They both were able to really heal each other, help one another deal with the dark histories they each brought into the relationship.

All in all I thought this was both a strong and weak book in the A-Tac series. I really liked the case they worked on, the twists and turns that Davis took us on throughout the story, and overall I enjoyed both Hannah and Harrison as our main characters. However, the undercover aspect really didn’t work for me and pulled me out of the story time and time again. Despite that, Davis continues to be a romantic suspense author who writes an incredible story and one I enjoy reading.
I give Deadly Dance a C-

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