A book lay on her bedside table. He flipped it open with one finger, read a single paragraph.

Man is the only creature that consumes without producing. He does not give milk, he does not lay eggs, he is too weak to pull the plough, he cannot run fast enough to catch rabbits. Yet he is lord of all the animals. He sets them to work, he gives back to them the bare minimum that will prevent them from starving, and the rest he keeps for himself.

Leander's lips curled into an amused smile. Animal Farm by George Orwell.

Ah, the exquisite irony.

“Don’t put yourself in danger like that again. Please. I can’t take it. It’s important to me that you’re safe, Jenna.” His arms tightened around her, hard, and his voice dropped to a whisper. “It’s more than important. It’s everything. I would give everything I have to make sure nothing hurts you.”

“You’re the one that can hurt me,” she protested, hating how weak it sounded. Ambivalence and euphoria were doing battle within her, and euphoria was quickly winning. She shook her head, trying to clear it. “I know you think you can keep me here—but I won’t be locked in a cage, Leander. I won’t be your prisoner.”

He dragged his lips over her neck, down to her collarbone. His teeth pressed against the tender flesh there so hard it stung.

“I can’t deny I want to keep you with me. And I want you to want to stay. But...I would do anything to make you happy. Even if it means letting you go, if that’s what you want. Even if it means breaking every Law there is. I’ll do anything, Jenna. I’ll do anything.”

Though his voice was hushed, muffled against her skin, she recognized the truth in it, the raw emotion, and she started with the abrupt realization that he would put himself in danger for her.

He was willing to release her, protect her, and take the consequences, with nothing in it for himself except pleasing her and inciting the rage of all those snarling dark beasts.

It pierced her in the center of her chest, an unfamiliar sweetness that brought a prick of tears to her eyes. She had forgotten sweetness, had forgotten what it was like to be touched and held and cherished, and it opened something in her, it melted her like sunlight on snow. When she next exhaled, all her fears and hesitation sifted away with her breath, leaving only warmth and certainty behind.

Happy Tuesday and welcome to another edition of Top Ten Tuesday, an event hosted by Jana @ That Artsy Reader Girl! I haven't done one of these in too long and I am glad to be able to bring my top ten list to you today. This week's theme is Spring Cleaning Freebie (for example, books you’re planning to get rid of for whatever reason, book’s you’d like to clean off your TBR by either reading them or deciding you’re not interested, books that feel fresh and clean to you after winter is over, etc.)

I chose to go back to the beginning of my Goodreads TBR and tackle the books that have been sitting, waiting to be read, the longest, which include:

Rose by Sydney Landon - a New Adult Contemporary Romance - My name is Rose Madden and I have spent my life being the perfect daughter. Thanks to my daddy, I'm an expert marksman who dresses like some modern day freaking June Cleaver. My life has been perfectly scripted since the day I was born. I've never deviated from the plan—until I met attorney Max Decker. Now he has me doing insane things to get his attention, like grabbing him in his car and being arrested for stalking my ex-boyfriend just so he'll come bail me out of jail. He thinks I'm crazy—but he wants me anyway, he just can't admit it. I'm tired of living my life for others, and Max has just given me a reason to show everyone that this good girl is going bad.

Revived by Samantha Towle - Contemporary Romance - Falling for his uptight therapist is not part of Leandro’s plan. Having unethical feelings for her patient, the angry Brazilian race car driver, is not part of India’s plan. But what if the wrong person is the only person who is right?

Fighting For Forever by J.B. Salsbury - Contemporary MMA Romance - She’s everything I hate about Vegas: a stripper, loose with her body and her morals. But there’s something about her, a complexity that she buries deep, and I’m determined to uncover it. The deeper I go, the less I understand. When I finally learn the truth, we engage in a battle where life and death hang in the balance. Fighting could kill us both, but if we win, forever is the prize.

Never Never by Colleen Hoover & Tarryn Fisher - YA Romance/Mystery - Charlie Wynwood and Silas Nash have been best friends since they could walk. They've been in love since the age of fourteen. But as of this morning... they are complete strangers. Their first kiss, their first fight, the moment they fell in love... every memory has vanished.

Confess by Colleen Hoover - New Adult Contemporary Romance - Auburn Reed is determined to rebuild her shattered life and she has no room for mistakes. But when she walks into a Dallas art studio in search of a job, she doesn’t expect to become deeply attracted to the studio’s enigmatic artist, Owen Gentry.

Tribeca by Callie Hart & Lili St. Germain - Dark Romance/Romantic Suspense/Thriller - Roberto Barbieri is known in the Kitchen by many names: Bobby B. The Barber of Brooklyn. Il Assassino. My brother and I call him Father. No matter what name you call him by, when Roberto Barbieri tells you do something, you do it. No questions asked. And you do NOT f*ck it up. - NOTE: this book hasn't been released and probably never will be :(

Bound to You: Volume 4 by Vanessa Booke - Contemporary Romance - I, Rebecca Gellar, am doing the unthinkable. I’m marrying a man who hits every category on my Run-Like-Hell list… 1. Arrogant. 2. Dangerously Handsome. 3. Brooding. 4. Domineering. 5. Possessive. 6. Playboy. The funny thing is I couldn’t be happier.

Hearts of Blue by L.H. Cosway - a standalone contemporary romance that tells the story of star-crossed lovers Karla Sheehan and Lee Cross, a police constable and the thief who steals her heart. She upholds the law. He breaks it.

It's a Wonderful Tangled Christmas Carol by Emma Chase - Contemporary Romance - After a blowout fight with Kate about his workaholic habits sends Drew to the office in anger on Christmas Eve, he falls asleep at his desk. There, three lovely holiday spirits magically visit him to teach him that every moment is precious and that he should never take his family for granted. But when he wakes up, will he just write it off as a dream?

Nuts by Alice Clayton - Chick Lit/Contemporary Romance - When gorgeous local farmer Leo Maxwell delivers her a lovely bunch of organic walnuts, Roxie wonders if a summer back home isn’t such a bad idea after all. Leo is heavily involved in the sustainable slow food movement, and he likes to take his time. In all things. Roxie is determined to head back to the west coast as soon as summer ends, but will the pull of lazy fireflies and her very own Almanzo Wilder be enough to keep her home for good?

---

Okay, so there you have it. Ten books that have been waiting for years to be read and I need to figure out which one(s) will stay and which will go. Tell me below which book you would kick off!! Oh, and if you have a TTT post, leave a link to it in the comments so I can come by and check it out :D

Check out my review of book 1, The Revelation of Light and Dark:

Leaning into me, Carrick warns, "Do not get aggressive with any form of fae or daemon. You stepped into Echo without any regard for your own safety. Had she wanted to, she could have hit you in the chest with enough force to rupture your aorta. You completely underestimated her, and you could have been seriously hurt."

"But... but... I had you, Titus, and Maddox there," I stutter a lame excuse.

"And you saw that neither one of us were able to stop her from doing that to you," he snaps, then lifts a finger and taps me on the head with it. "You need to think, Finley, or you're going to get yourself hurt or killed."

I wrench my arm away from him, now angry at being treated like a child. "I do think, I'm clever and yes, I may have underestimated her, but I went up against an incubus and won, I was smart enough to get out of an enclosed space in my bedroom, and lure him to my backyard so I could use my whip to —"

"You got lucky," he snarls. "Humans are no match for fae or daemons in strength. Don't ever forget it and always be wary, even if one appears to be on your side."

"Like Zaid?"

"Zaid isn't on your side," he replies, pointing out. "He's on my side."

I was going to kiss her.

But first I was going to strangle her.

“Duane…” She said my name again in that breathless way, making my neck itch and my throat tight.

Jessica was looking at me expectantly. Her big amber eyes on mine like I was the center of her world. I liked it too much. It was also irritating because I didn’t know what it meant, what she was thinking. She hadn’t said a damn word to me on our walk back from the lake. She hadn’t called me. We hadn’t spoken since Friday.

Five days. Five days without touching or tasting her.

I was going to kiss her while I strangled her.

“Yeah?” I said, the edge of my irritation clear. I wasn’t trying to hide it, there was no need. One way or the other we were coming to an agreement that involved definites, not definitely maybes. Better she knew I wasn’t planning on rolling over unless it involved her beneath me.

Jessica blinked at me, likely because of my tone, and I watched her shake herself a little like I’d startled her.

“Uh, so… the truck.” She cleared her throat, her eyes sliding to the side and away from me.

“What about the truck?”

“You towed it.”

“Yes I did.” I allowed myself a moment to look at her body. She was wearing a pink shirt with buttons down the front, thin fabric with a white, lacy tank top under. It was tucked into a tan skirt that ended at her knees. She was also wearing brown high heeled boots, the kind that don’t make sense.

Boots are for working, for walking through wet mud, for keeping feet from getting shredded by broken glass and falling machine parts. Boots with spiked heels were just as practical as sandals with steel toes.

Still not looking at me, she asked, “So, you want to buy it?” Her voice was different, higher pitched.

“That’s what I just said.” Again, my irritation was clear.

Her eyes cut to mine, throwing me splinters of frustration. “Well there’s no need to be rude, Duane.”

“I’m sorry, was I being rude?” I couldn’t help myself, I took a full step forward, forcing her to lift her chin to keep eye contact. “Should I have called?”

“Yes.” She ground out, “You can’t just tow other peoples’ cars without asking.”

“Excuse me, princess. But Mike McClure called me and asked me if I minded moving the truck here. I figured he was calling on your behalf.”

“No he wasn’t calling on my behalf. If I wanted to call you, I would have just called you.”

I felt those words in my stomach, just under my ribs, a quick slice. I’m sure I winced because her expression changed, but before she could explain away her meaning, I cut her off.

“Fine, I get you, loud and clear.”

“Duane-”

I lifted my hands to keep her from talking. She was so lovely, even her voice was pretty. But suddenly I couldn’t wait for her to leave and put me out of this misery of being with her when she wasn’t interested in being mine.

“We want to buy the truck and I’m willing to offer you a fair amount.”

“Would you just hold on a sec-” Jessica took my hand between hers, her grip surprisingly strong, her skin against mine sending a shock up my arm. I ignored it and ground my teeth.

“You can use the money for a new car, something smaller that gets better mileage.”

Paying no heed, Jessica took a half step forward catching me unawares. One second she was glaring at me, the next she was lifting to her tip toes and brushing her lips against mine.

And that was it, I was done for.

My favorite quote:
"There was an English guy in Afghanistan. He was a member of the Royal Marines but the British government loaned him to us as an informant. He'd been taken prisoner by a group of rebels after his unit's transport hit an IED and killed everyone but him. For nearly two years the rebels kept him hostage in a cave system, giving him just enough food and water so that he could survive. They would torture him every day. They wanted to know everything he knew. They would pull his fingers and his toenails out one by one. They would pull his teeth out too, whenever he wouldn't give them information they wanted. This guy. Andrew, he held out for months. He took the pain and the torment, and he let them take his fingernails and his teeth, until the people who were holding him captive realized they weren't going to get anything out of him.
"Now, that was a really bad position to be in for Andrew. The only reason they were keeping him alive was because he was worth something. If he wasn't valuable to them alive in any way, he sure as hell would be valuable to them dead. See they don't just kill people in the shadows. They want the world to see. They gather their friends. They gather the world's media. They make us watch on television as they force their prisoners to tell lies about their countries, and then they make us watch as they cut off their heads and burn their bodies in cages.
"Andrew nearly died that way. They sat him down in front of a camera and they told him what they wanted him to say, otherwise they were going to have their friends in England track down his wife and two small kids, and they were gonna have them murdered in their beds. You always think you won't cave, that nothing they can do or say to you will make you give in and repeat the hatred they want to spread, but when they threaten your loved ones..." Jamie looks pained. He flinches a little, small creases forming between his eyebrows. "So Andrew sat down and said what they wanted him to say, and they filmed it. The bastards restrained him while they tried to slit his throat from behind, so the camera could see. They almost finished the job. Andrew had a scar that ran from his left ear to his Adam's apple, but that's where it stopped. Miraculously one of our unit's launched an assault on the caves. We had no idea they were holding anyone captive there. We'd had intel that they were using the location as a munitions cache and we wanted to take it out.
"So they stormed the place and Andrew only got his throat half cut. He came and worked with Cade and me for a long time. He told us in graphic detail about the shit those guys did to him. The kinds of torture they were capable of. And he told us that it paled in comparison to the atrocities he saw committed by the cartels in Mexico. He cried like a baby when he told us about that. He'd gone in as part of a task force to rescue a British government official who had been taken right off the street in Juarez. They'd found this guy and his wife in an open grave under a bridge in the middle of the city. The bodies had been mutilated beyond recognition. When the marines attempted to recover the bodies, they'd realized that both the official and his wife were still alive. they were fucked up and bleeding, missing skin, missing fingers, both of them missing their tongues and their eyes. Their ears. Her breasts had been cut off. His dick. They were just raw pieces of meat, and they'd tossed their bodies into a hole while they were still bleeding.
"The cartels did that to them. Not even a hardened marine who'd been held captive in the desert and almost died at the hands of some of the most immoral men on this planet could talk about the shit he saw in Mexico without his hands shaking. And these are the people we're dealing with right now, Sophia. This is the type of madness we're involving ourselves in. Cade and I were deployed. A lot of the other Widow Makers are ex military, too. We've all had training. We've all been in combat situations. We've been to the dark places of this world and we've already puked our guts up. We've already seen enough to make it difficult to sleep at night."
He stops talking for a second. Gives me a second to digest. I already know what he's going to say next, and the gravity of his words really hit home. I grip hold of the counter, leaning into it, tired and terrified as Jamie continues.
"And you want to go racing after these guys half cocked, Sophia. What about your upbringing in Seattle as a preacher's daughter, living with everything you could possibly need, never having to make hard decisions or real sacrifices, qualifies you to face off with these guys when grown ass marienes cry like babies at the mere thought of it?"

Happy Weekend! It's been a while since I've scoured through Amazon looking for deals to share. I hope something here makes your reading soul smile :) All books are under $2 (at the time of this post) For more sales & freebies (because they might still be on sale or free), CLICK HERE and Happy Hunting!