Title: A Stone in the Sea
Author: AL Jackson
Series: Bleeding Stars #1
Publisher: Self-Published
Release Date: February 23, 2015
Genre: Contemporary Romance, New Adult
More Info: Goodreads
Purchase: Amazon US
Purchase: Amazon UK
Purchase: iTunes
Purchase: Amazon Print

He wanted nothing at all…

Until he found she had everything to give…

Sunder lead singer and guitarist Sebastian Stone has everything—fans, fame, and fortune. He also has a heart full of bitterness and a reputation for a short-fused temper. But an outward reputation rarely reveals the true man inside. Facing assault charges after trying to protect his younger brother, Sebastian is sent to Savannah, Georgia to lie low until the dust settles in L.A.

Shea Bentley is beautiful, kind, and hiding from the very lifestyle Sebastian has always embraced.

When the mysterious, tattooed stranger begins hanging out at the bar where she works, Shea is quick to recognize he is nothing but trouble, but she’s helpless to the way her body lights up every time his intense gray eyes tangle with hers.

They both soon find themselves drowning in a sea of desire and passion that won’t let them up for air.

Sebastian knows firsthand secrets never die, and he’s not the only one who’s hiding them.

Loving someone always comes with a price. But will it be Shea’s past that costs them everything?

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Excerpt

With a smile, I turned around, then froze when my sight registered the obscured figure leaning against the wall. A strangled gasp caught in my throat, and my heart took off at a sprint, blood pounding hard in my ears.

Pushing from the wall, he stepped from the shadows, his hands again stuffed deep in his pockets.

My heart rate only increased, the energy radiating from him almost as strong as the disappointment he’d left me with when he’d gone.

I pressed my hand to my chest to try to still the panic thundering against my ribs. “You scared me.”

“I’m sorry.” The words were soft. “That’s the last thing I want to do.”

But he did. I was scared of what he was capable of doing to me, the way I knew he held the power to trounce all over this hammering heart, to hold it in his hand and crush it into a million unrecognizable pieces.

“What are you doing here?” I asked on a shaky breath.

He looked to the sky and exhaled heavily, before he leveled his gaze back on me. “The same thing I’m doing every night, Shea. Thinking about you and wondering why the hell I can’t stop.”

My stomach flipped, and I gulped for air.

“What do you want from me?”

He laughed, lifted his elbows out to his sides in a helpless gesture without pulling his hands free. “Dinner?”

Nonsensical laughter shot from me. “At three in the morning?”

“Breakfast?” he amended, a coy smile pulling at his full, crooked lips.

Tingles spread across my skin, and I ran my hands up my bare arms. “I already told you I don’t have time for distractions.”

“Come on, Shea. It’s just food. Go out with me. Just tonight.”

Somehow I knew it was a lie, even though he wanted to believe it was true.

Nervously, I glanced to the back door all the while being inexplicably drawn to this man I didn’t even know. I knew I should make a break for it, run for the safety of my little world and give him no opportunity to rip it apart.

“I am hungry,” I found myself saying. After a long night of work, it was true. But it had nothing to do with the reason I was giving in.

Because I just wanted to…

I shook my head.

That was it. I just wanted. I wanted to be in his space. I wanted to understand why he had this pull on me. I wanted him.

Even though I’d never allow myself to have him.

My Review

One thing you can expect when you journey into an A.L. Jackson story is pure, unadulterated magic filled angst. You can expect to be taken to places so low you didn’t know you could get there, but in the end, through all the strife, the road is so beautiful you don’t even mind. She gives you layers upon layers of raw beauty, just enough to balance out the pain. And when you find yourself on the last page, you sigh with relief. Not because it’s over, but because you survived. You survived and you know you’ll never be the same. She touches parts of your heart you never knew existed and her characters become a permanent part of your chemical makeup.

 I just wanted. I wanted to be in his space. I wanted to understand why he had this pull on me. I wanted him.

This story was wrought with layers and secrets and I know we’ve only begun to scratch the surface. I find myself living for her delicious cliffhangers, and as always, she never disappoints. Baz and Shea. It’s hard to know where to begin because although you find out some of their secrets pretty early on, it’s best you discover them yourself. But these two characters, from what I’ve read already, WILL break me. Of this I know for sure. First off, his name. Sebastian. One of my top male names and I’m so in love with it. So right off the bat this story was going good places in my eyes. The more he fought himself, the harder I fell for him. Here was a man whose self-deprication bled into love, and the process it took is not even near to being over.

I could feel her storm swarming us, taking us whole. Vapors and whispers of her unknown.

Shea was a tough nut to crack, but it was so worth the wait. She truly has such a beautiful soul, and when you discover her first secret, well, you’ll never be able to let her go. The scenes that this reveal result in for the remainder of the book are some of my favorite. And the emotion in one of the last scenes, that you’ll know when you get to, is unprecedented. I felt it to my core and I am still shaking. But this was a girl who life had beaten down, yet she still kept getting back up. She is more of a mystery that Baz, but I am already in love with what I’ve seen.

“Don’t understand this, Shea. Not for a second. But I’m never going to be the same.”

Jackson proves once again why she is a the top of her game with this beautiful yet scorching tale of forgiveness and redemption. It’s surely one you won’t soon forget!

I wanted him raw.

Unbridled.

Because it was the truth he could afford to give me.

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