bureau of paranormal affairs coverRating: 4.25 stars
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Length: Anthology

 

This book combines all three novellas in the Bureau of Paranormal Affairs series: Grizzly Affair, A Shifter Concern, and Their Grizzly Hero. These stories involve protective mates, wounded mates, fated mates, and threesomes. They are full of sex, suspense, and love.

In Grizzly Affair, agents Spencer and Roarke are on the trail of a murderer who has been targeting young male prostitutes and leaving no trace behind. But while the two men are neck deep in dead bodies and Spencer’s endless flirting — something he’s been enjoying for the past six months, as he’s quite in love with Roarke who isn’t looking for anything more than a fling, and reluctant to endanger their friendship with a one-night stand — Roarke’s struggling with the onset of his heat cycle.

Spencer isn’t going to be a gentleman about this. He’s going to be there for Roarke … until he realizes all that means. Not just a quick tumble in the sheets, but several. A dozen or so a night. For several nights. Spencer also knows that no matter how willing he is, as a human, he’s just not able to endure a shifter’s rut. So when Roarke suggests bringing in a third, another shifter, to help … Spencer says yes.

Enter Grigore, a Roma wolf who has been looking in all the wrong places for his mate only to find him. And him. Because Grigore has two hot men in his future, and no plans to ever let them go.

 

A Shifter Concern has a similar case. Two agents, Akoni and Naoko — wolf and leopard shifters — are bonded mates on the trail of a killer stalking young male prostitutes on the streets. When the two of them find Slater, a young human hiding in an alley, they take him home, knowing he’s their third. Slater, who has endured a lifetime of abuse, needs time to learn to trust the two strangers who have appeared in his life like knights in shining armor. The only problem is that the killer might not give any of them that chance.

This story, unlike the first, has an established couple bringing in a third. And while shifters might take the whole fated mate thing seriously, it’s different for a human, and Slater’s first thought is how to get out of this situation, and what he can steal and pawn from their house. I appreciated this small and brief nod to the reality of couple dynamics being altered to become a thruple, and how Spencer had to come to terms with the idea of falling for someone who came with a partner.

 

Their Grizzly Hero is the more action packed of the three stories, with agent Holt Rainmaker being kidnapped by a ring of shifter traffickers using shifters in trophy hunts — and then stuffing and mounting the bodies after. While in a cage, Holt meets his mate, a pine martin shifter named Bastian, who has endured a great deal in the nine months he’s been a the mercy of his kidnappers. Charging into the fray is grizzly shifter, Decker, who recognized the smell of his mate and followed it … only to find not one, but two mates.

This final story serves as a wonderful closing scene with a happily ever after ending for everyone involved. However, while all of the stories were fun and steamy, there’s a lot of the world building left lying by the side of the road. I would very much like to see more of this author’s shifter worlds in longer stories, where more time could be given to the intricate creation of shifters, hybrids, witches, and fae that they’ve created. This is definitely an enjoyable book, and an author to keep an eye on for future releases.

As a note, there are some trigger warnings to be mentioned: trigger mentions of rape, sexual assault, kidnapping, torture, forced impregnation and ‘breeding’, as well as brutal murders. All of these are in the background — a threat of violence, or an event that happened to a character in the past, but they are there and some readers may find the subject matter uncomfortable.