The Bodyguard
Summary:
She's got his back. He's got her heart. They've got a secret. What could possibly go wrong?
Hannah Brooks looks more like a kindergarten teacher than somebody who could kill you with her bare hands. But the truth is, she's an elite bodyguard and she's just been hired to protect a superstar actor from his stalker.
Jack Stapleton's a Hollywood heartthrob - captured by paparazzi on beaches the world over, rising out of the waves in clingy board shorts and glistening like a Roman deity.
When Jack's mom gets sick, he comes home to the family's Texas ranch to help out. Only one catch: He doesn't want his family to know about his stalker. Or the bodyguard thing. And so Hannah - against her will and her better judgment - finds herself pretending to be Jack's girlfriend as a cover.
Protecting Jack should be easy. But protecting her own heart? That's the hardest thing she's ever done...(Summary and cover courtesy of goodreads.com)
Review:
Occasionally, it’s nice to get a PG rated romance that has characters of some substance, but maintain the low investment, high reward satisfying read. This fit the bill on all marks. We hit a lot of tropes here so if that’s going to drive you nuts, go ahead and set this aside for another day. Celebrity falls in love with a ‘normal girl’. Instalove (basically). Forced proximity. Fake relationship. Yet while all that seems like a recipe for a disaster, Center does a lovely job weaving them together to become a compelling read end to end.
When we meet Hannah she’s all over the place (as is Jack) and it wasn’t clear to me if she was going to endear herself as a protagonist. Soon enough though we see a bit more of her backbone and how she can bloom with change of scene. Some of the miscommunication elements between Jack and Hannah seemed legitimately annoying / unrealistic which pulled me out of the story, but his family made up for those. Throw in a handful of funny scenes with a bit of drama and we have all the elements of a fun romance.
Warning: Contains violence
Rating: 4 stars!
Who should read it? Romance fans looking for something lighter and without a dose of smut.