Isaac and Zane are best friends, and they are partners at work. They work for a secret elite special forces unit called Infinity. They also have secrets.
Isaac’s secret is that he is in love with his straight best friend (Zane). He was coping with it until the two of them were holed up in a safe house for a few months. That happened before the events of this book, but they talk about it. It was a mostly blissful few months and the two bonded and had the best time, until it got kind of weird at the end. Things are now pretty strained between the two.
Zane’s secret is that he is actually bi, and is developing feelings for Isaac. Zane has known that he was bi all his life but initially hid it for reasons explained in the book, and then the longer he went without saying anything the harder it became to tell anyone. So now he is in his 30s and still in the closet. I do think it’s a little odd that he wasn’t comfortable telling people because pretty much all the guys in Infinity are gay, as are pretty much all the guys that Infinity works with. And they are also good friends, so when Zane is at work and when he is at social events he’s the only straight guy. And his brother is gay. But I have never been a man who is secretly bisexual so I can’t judge.
This series is generally pretty fun, as is the Out for Justice series (the two cross over a lot). This one was a little less fun, because Zane and Isaac were insufferable for the first half of the book. They didn’t communicate well. One would think that something was wrong with the other but instead of asking, they would just make some sort of an (incorrect) assumption, then their feelings would get hurt at the imaginary problem and so they would pout and get snippy, which would cause the other guy to think something is wrong and the cycle would start all over. It wasn’t until about halfway through that they got past that.
I am not in the military, but even I can recognize when books are unrealistic. And unrealistic is ok, because this is fiction and people like to read as an escape from the real world. But this book took it too far. Infinity is terrible. If I were in a terrorist situation I would prefer that you sent in the volunteer fire brigade, or anyone else. Just not Infinity. None of the people on the team seemed to be particularly perceptive. Zane and Isaac were distracted on all of their missions either arguing about their problems or thinking about their problems. And the higher ups were very lenient and seemed to be trying to do some low-key underhanded match making. Zane and Isaac were so unfocused that they were a threat to their team. They should have been dismissed. And a couple of new guys were selected to be part of Infinity but the selection process didn’t seem thorough enough for an elite special forces unit. One guy had PTSD and was filthy and was on a two week bender after losing much of his team in a roadside bomb, but they saw potential and made him an immediate member of the team. Yes he was a hero, but was he in a place physically or mentally where he could handle the work? When he reported to work he still had bloodshot eyes.
The blurb says that it can be read as a stand-alone, but I don’t think that it can. Events from other books in the series were referenced. And there are SO MANY characters, including characters from previous books in this series, as well as the Code of Honor series. And there wasn’t a lot of exposition on who they were, so if you hadn’t read the other books you wouldn’t know. There were also new characters introduced, and some of them were very clearly being set up for future books. I found the book was hard to follow at times because there were too many people, and I lost track of who was doing what and who was talking. It also detracted from the main story. It took the focus off of Isaac and Zane. There needed to be less people.
I usually love the best friends who are pining for each other trope, but the main characters acted like angsty teenagers. It was especially disappointing because you knew that something was up between these two in all of the previous books, and the payoff wasn’t really there. I had been so excited to finally read Isaac and Zane’s story, so I wish it has been a little more. Maybe the build-up was part of the problem.
I am, however, pretty excited about one of the future pairings that was hinted at in the epilogue.
I would recommend the other books in this series, as well as the Code of Honor series. And if this is the first one you read and it wasn’t your cup of tea, don’t give up on the author.