Title:  Reflected In You
Author: Sylvia Day
Publisher/Year:  Penguin Group (USA) 10/23/12
Length:  432 pages
Series: Crossfire #2

Overview

Gideon Cross. As beautiful and flawless on the outside as he was damaged and tormented on the inside. He was a bright, scorching flame that singed me with the darkest of pleasures. I couldn’t stay away. I didn’t want to. He was my addiction… my every desire… mine.

My past was as violent as his, and I was just as broken. We’d never work. It was too hard, too painful… except when it was perfect. Those moments when the driving hunger and desperate love were the most exquisite insanity. We were bound by our need. And our passion would take us beyond our limits to the sweetest, sharpest edge of obsession…

My Thoughts

OMG – that’s basically the feeling that i’m left with after i read this book, and let me tell you it was SO HARD for me to put it down yesterday morning when i had to come to work.  This second installment of the series DID NOT DISAPPOINT.   I think Sylvia Day is one of the best authors out there today because of her ability to draw you in, keep you intrigued and then throw even more curve balls at you that you can’t quite get your head around.

Book 2 picks up right where we left off in Bared to You – the night of the huge orgy fest in Eva’s apartment and Gideon trying to help deal with that aftermath while also trying to deal with the fact that he kind of blew it again at the party where his ex fiance and Maggie were there.  Eva is still so hurt and upset with what Gideon has done that she’s not sure how to deal with everything, and on top of it all, both of them are SO DAMAGED that they continually want to keep hurting each other even if it’s just as a test (subconsciously).

so in this 2nd book, we see even more of the roller coaster known as the Eva/Gideon train wreck yet their intentions are so good deep down that you want to root for them. Throughout the story, Eva continues to try to get the the bottom of what is going on with Gideon, yet he’s so secretive because he thinks that if she knows all about him she’d run.  She’s told him that she won’t but that’s not good enough apparently.  He still has his nightmares which plays an even larger role in this story because now they are coinciding with Eva’s nightmares as well.  Nathan is not only haunting her in her dreams, but he manages to do the same in real life to an extent as well.  Gideon’s nightmares makes it so bad that the decision is made at one point that they can’t share the same bed at night anymore because it’s just not safe.  one night a nightmare causes Gideon to leave and Eva to realize that she doesn’t have the strength to ask him to stay.

Cary plays a smaller role in this story, kind of more in the background until much later in yet another twist.  We get to see a brief attempt at Eva trying to make ‘female friends’ and separate herself from Gideon a bit since it’s just not healthy how much she ‘needs’ him.  Megumi and Shawna are our token females, yet i’m not quite sure if there’s going to be more for them in the 3rd book.  i kind of feel like it’ll be a let down if not because we had a chapter or 2 with both, and i kind of grew to like them.  also, with the introduction of Will the new assistant – i’m kind of wondering what will go there.  i’m a cynic to think that you can’t just introduce a character that briefly without having some type of story for him.

One thing that i LOVED was that we get to see Victor – Eva’s dad.  their interaction is so genuine and so loving that you wish things could be different.  Sylvia Day did an amazing job with him – he’s the kind of guy that saw what he got dealt in life, and what he deserved and yet realized that he shoudln’t hang on to what would never work out and just be happy with how things ended.  Even though he didn’t marry Eva’s mom, and even though he loved her and STILL loves her, he knows that things were all for the best and if for nothing else, he got an amazing daughter out of it that really wants to keep that relationship open.  I loved also seeing the interaction between Eva’s mom and dad.  that was ‘golden’

speaking of Golden – wasn’t that a nice surprise – that one of Eva’s past men comes back.  kind of nice that she had that happen while Gideon has Corinne (and Maggie) around.  I can’t wait to see how persistent Brett becomes in book 3 since i recall that interview that he did saying that he wasn’t going to give up that easy (in different words though).

In addition to a great story line that keeps giving and giving, the sexual chemistry between Evan and Gideon is insurmountable.  there’s nothing to compare it to, and i think that the author accomplished quite a feat by being able to keep it so hot every time they come together, especially since it’s so often.  I think in stories like 50 Shades we’re able to see the variety there since there’s a lot of BDSM involved – meaning that there’s always another toy to play with but in the Crossfire trilogy, we’re seeing just raw animal sex here – it’s just person to person without any of the kinky stuff.  just people who want to touch one another and can’t get enough.  It makes you realize that you don’t have to necessarily be into all that other stuff if you want to have a hot sex life – you can still accomplish it one on one and i like that.  it’s one thing to get all hot and bothered reading about a submissive being controlled by her dom but here, we know that Gideon is a dom, but not in the same pain/pleasure way that we’ve read about so much before.

so a few things

1) we never find out what Gideon left in Eva’s apartment that night in book 1 did we?

2) what’s going to happen with Corinne and Brett (not together clearly, but for their respective exes)

3) what will come of the investigation?  will it truly be over and closed?

4) what will happen for Eva at work – will she get promoted, quit, or what?

5) WHAT WILL HAPPEN FOR EVA/GIDEON?  given that we’re all hopeless romantics, i’m sure that we’ll get to see a happy ending eventually, i just hope that book 3 is a LONG one so that we can wrap up the story with a lot of juicy ness – relationship roller coasters and GREAT Sex