Criss Cross by Jordan Castillo Price

rating
(PsyCop #2)
  M/M ROMANCE, URBAN FANTASY


Criss Cross finds the ghosts surrounding Victor getting awfully pushy. The medications that Victor usually takes to control his abilities are threatening to destroy his liver, and his new meds aren't any more effective than sugar pills.

Vic is also adjusting to a new PsyCop partner, a mild-mannered guy named Roger with all the personality of white bread. At least he's willing to spring for the Starbucks.

Jacob’s ex-boyfriend, Crash, is an empathic healer who might be able to help Victor pull his powers into balance, but he seems more interested in getting into Victor’s pants than in providing any actual assistance.




This book would fly by even if it weren't so short. At least it's almost 200 pages this time around, rather than a mere 89 pages like the first.

There's not a strong outright mystery for Vic to put his magic-mojo detective skills towards, but instead the problems hits closer to home. He has to figure out who to trust and ends up trusting the wrong people for the wrong reasons despite best intentions, but hey, how many books and movies would we be without if that common plot trope didn't exist?

Victor is still enjoyable as the troubled and awkward psych who stumbles through his relationship with Jacob like he's walking in a field filled with landmines, and this isn't helped by the introduction to a bizarre ex who shoots hostility with one statement, flirtation with the next.

Criss Cross mainly focuses on the romantic relationship angles, but it ends by digging into a dark theme and shows what happens when Victor is misled by the wrong people. Creepy stuff, it's dark world that's creatively done.

While the introduction in the first book made bedroom play hot, it's a little repetitive and overdone here, making it almost erotica rather than m/m romance. It carries enough story to make it worth reading though, and was hard to put down despite small annoyances.



   Book Quotes:

“My waking life probably gave my subconscious an inferiority complex.”

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