I love and will always buy a K A book. I just needed more than a 7 year romance/renovation of a house/cabins story. I was really drawn in at the beginning...kept thinking we were getting set up for some major story line. It was not to be sadly. I really needed a bad guy from Deacon's past to show up or Grant to cause a bit of mischief. There were a few "unhappy" cabin renters that were exciting parts of the book. ( )

Loved it. May be my favorite of this series so far. ( )

Deacon is the story of Deacon and Cassidy Swallow. Deacon is a cold, quiet, unreachable man, but when he comes to the cabins in the woods that Cassidy is restoring, he finds her fighting with her boyfriend and decides to stay in cabin 11. After six years of coming and going from cabin 11, Deacon and Cassidy finally give in to their attraction, but will Cassidy be satisfied with a man who only visits occasionally and won't tell her anything about himself?
There is a lot of build up in this story as to why Deacon is so very detached from life. Cassidy trusts him more than most women would for an extended period of time and pays the price. Deacon is a tough character to understand throughout most of the book and Cassidy's willingness to trust him so completely is a little hard to accept, but overall, this was a good entry in the Unfinished Hero series. I am finding, however, that the men in this series are all starting to run together because the are so much alike with similar speech patterns and problems. Also, this book did not further the connect to the story line about Knight's issues until the last few pages of the book but still a good story. ( )

Deacon is the story of Deacon and Cassidy Swallow. Deacon is a cold, quiet, unreachable man, but when he comes to the cabins in the woods that Cassidy is restoring, he finds her fighting with her boyfriend and decides to stay in cabin 11. After six years of coming and going from cabin 11, Deacon and Cassidy finally give in to their attraction, but will Cassidy be satisfied with a man who only visits occasionally and won't tell her anything about himself?
There is a lot of build up in this story as to why Deacon is so very detached from life. Cassidy trusts him more than most women would for an extended period of time and pays the price. Deacon is a tough character to understand throughout most of the book and Cassidy's willingness to trust him so completely is a little hard to accept, but overall, this was a good entry in the Unfinished Hero series. I am finding, however, that the men in this series are all starting to run together because the are so much alike with similar speech patterns and problems. Also, this book did not further the connect to the story line about Knight's issues until the last few pages of the book but still a good story. ( )

Leave it to me to stumble onto this story and mid-way through it figure out it's part of a series.

Did it stop me from finishing it or loving it...NOPE!

Cassidy meets John Priest one night when he comes to rent one of her cabins and she is arguing, yet again, with her boyfriend. Unfriendly is putting it mildly when it comes to Priest but still, he's caught Cassidy's eye. Years go by and a pattern emerges. Boyfriend is gone, Priest comes back for days at a time after being gone months at a time. Then one time it happens. Cassidy is handling a bad situation and Priest is there to have her back. After all is dealt with his temper flares that she has to wade into dangerous situations alone and it all comes out. The secret wanting, for years, the hoping she would have a man so he wouldn't feel the need to go back and see her, her secretly pining away for him.

Their sexual relationship is from the very beginning off the charts and hot. She learns to take what he has to offer. Be that a few days here and there or him doing little things to make it easier to be separated from her by knowing his made her world a little more secure. Puppies, new shingles on the roof, and new gutters aside...he does what he can to show her she means something to him. Cassie, as (real name) Deacon calls her, returns the favor...letting him do what he has to do and holding him to his promise that when he's ready he'll leave his other life behind and spend the rest of his days with her and those cabins.

Of course life never goes that smoothly. After sometime together and right before he is set to meet her family Cassie is putting away his clothes when she finds Deacon's wedding photo. She confronts him thinking that his secret life is that he's married and now she's his mistress. Deacon in typical alpha male mode doesn't answer her one way or the other. He takes her ultimatum to heart and leaves without explanation or excuse. It takes 6 months and a good, trusted friend to make Deacon see that life before Cassie ...well there is no going back to that and he can't move forward without facing his past and his feelings for Cassie.

When he finally gets back to her and gives her his whole story, I admit I cried our loud and it wasn't pretty. No wonder he had cut himself off from emotion and people. At first I thought maybe Cassie made it too easy on him to come back and win his place back in her life and heart, then I remembered, this is who she has been from the beginning. For her not to see past the hurt and find out what a blessing she had been giving in winning his love in the first would have gone against her character. She knew he had a shady past, she knew there were things going on that he wanted to make sure never touched her, and she suspected that not all he did was legal so with all that she still fell in love with him and gave him his space to do what needed to be done before he came home to her; now when he left that world behind and let her know what he was leaving why wouldn't she take it at face value and accept him just like that.

Another thing I have learned with KA's books, there is always a soundtrack to them and once again she hit it on the head. Cassie giving him Christina Aguilar's song to understand what she needed. (His actually listening to it and taking it all in!) Then when he gave her Beautiful War....see you know the mood just by the song. (Also get a kick how we get subtle reminders of other series... Max Holden and the Rock Chicks!)

It was a story I wasn't sure I was going to like, think that's because I didn't know the background to Deacon and who he was in relation to the series, but once I got invested in it I was fully invested in it. Can't wait to go and read Nick's story. Then I'll think about how soon I want to wait before I go back and get all the other stories. ( )