Title: Tangled up in Hate
Author: Charlotte Byrd
Publisher/Year: Byrd Books 3/219/19
Length: 186 Pages
Series: Tangled #4
Overview
Epic love requires an epic sacrifice…
A long time ago, I borrowed money from a very powerful family. I paid my debt, but they have come for more.
They want everything that I have built and they will hurt her if I refuse.
Harley doesn’t understand why I have to break her heart. She hates me, but at least she’s okay…for now.
But what happens when sending her away isn’t enough?
What happens when I lose everything?
My Thoughts
Further and further we go into the turmoil and stress in the world of Harley and Jackson. The last scenes from the last book – the third installment was that of a wedding. One that perhaps would have surprised us two books ago, but one that we should have expected after we saw the results of the kidnapping. Harley’s parents get re-married in NYC with the blessing of Harley which is a nice change of things. At the ceremony, we also learn that Jackson has a ring in his pocket for Harley because even though they’ve only been together a short time, he knows that she’s the one.
So as a reader, i’m giddy to find out when the moment will happen and what will come in between now and then since you know nothing can be that easy. they don’t quite get their happy ending yet because of so many unresolved things with Parker, Sam, the lost money from the Ponzi scheme and so much more. Let’s table this for now….
In this fourth book, we watch Harley come into her own. She’s self-published her first novel and she’s actually seeing success as a result. People are buying her book and that’s giving her so much more confidence and inspiration to continue the story.
Jackson seems to have a bit of a plan on how to help out his company, until the worst thing happens….His past comes back to haunt him. and that doesn’t just break his professional life, he ends up breaking Harley’s heart as well.
We’re taken about ten years in the past to the starting point of Minetta, when Jackson is trying to find funding for his company and gets the suggestion from his mother for a bookie that they’ve worked with in the past as a result of his father’s gambling problems. Jackson gets a loan from a man named Andrew Liddell, and even though he repays the money in two days, he realizes that hes bound to this man forever. And that comes to haunt him in the present, when Liddell wants half of Minetta.
The story from here is bleak. Jackson breaks up with Harley and she doesn’t understand why. All she did was go into the wing of the house that Jackson told her to stay away from, but she thought that given the dynamic shift of their relationship, it was ok. Apparently not. So Harley’s heart broken, and it’s for a reason that she’s left in the dark about.
Jackson knows that she’s become a target for Liddell and pushes her away for her protection. Too bad there’s another target – Aurora, and she’s used as a negotiating tactic for Liddell to get what he wants. He pays Jackson $51M for 51% of the company and that takes us on a trajectory that’s down a black hole but potentially a good thing.
On the other side of this turmoil is Harley – she’s left desolate, not even really with the will to live. While Jackson gave her money after they split up, she’s not willing to take it. She wallows in her misery, not even writing and that’s really the only way that she can get her mind off things. She winds up sick, and learns that there’s more going on than just depression here -and that raises more questions and uncertainty for her and everyone to be honest.
We get another love story that runs underneath the main one now that Harley’s parents are married again. We get to see Julie find her prince charming and interestingly it’s in the form of Martin, Harley’s bodyguard. They start to grow a friendship while he’s in their studio continuing to protect Harley, and it’s the kind of relationship that Julie deserves. A man who is good and honest and wants to give her the world.
Where we net out in this story is a gunshot to the forehead, a relationship that’s on unknown ground and an assailant that we’re still not sure who it is. We thought Liddell got all that he wanted but maybe not? We still don’t know where Parker is and perhaps he’s back stalking Harley. We know that Sam’s out of jail and cannot be trusted….and we have a life in the balance ….again.
I’m going to thank this lovely hurricane that’s bearing down on my area right now for giving me time to read even more installments of this series, so onto the next and I hope you’re all having a good weekend. Enjoy!