Deadly Pursuit by Misty Evans

Her sting operation put a ruthless criminal in prison.
One year ago, rookie FBI agent Celina Davenport pulled off the ultimate undercover operation…she seduced Emilio Londano – the dangerous leader of the San Diego Mafia – and destroyed his illegal empire.
Now he’s escaped and looking for revenge.
When Londano escapes a maximum security prison and begins picking off Celina’s friends and coworkers, everyone she knows becomes a target. Including DEA agent Cooper Harris, the man who once broke her heart and is now assigned to be her bodyguard.
How far will they go to stop him?
Cooper and Celina must risk their careers – and their hearts –to turn the table on their pursuer. But will their past, with its forbidden passions and impulsive choices, put them directly in his crosshairs?
The story has a slow start, and almost lost me in the first 20% of it.
Celina and Cooper surely have lots of chemistry, unfortunately most of it is submerged into the office politics, into the regulations of different alphabet soup agencies, and introductions of the situation, with army of secondary characters.
The suspense part of the story is engaging, with enough surprises, twists and turns to keep the interest. The tension is tangible, the action interesting, and the hand-to-hand combat scenes heart
Towards the end I started to get to know the cast, and enjoyed their interactions, even though Lana made my skin crawl. Just to get to know more about the team, I would continue to read the series.
Cooper is charming, protective, smart, 'the Beast', alpha male who likes animals and kids ~completely swoon worthy man.
Celina comes off rather childish, and deserves her nickname 'kid'. She is 14 years, 6 months, and 4 days younger than Cooper, and it shows in her behavior and decisions she makes. Since the first time they met, she has been relentlessly and openly after Cooper so that the whole team is aware of it. She was difficult to relate to, and for that reasons not easy to like either.
Overall the story was enjoyable read, and I know I want check out the next book in the series.  This installment gets three spoons with a little teaspoon on the side from me..

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Deadly Pursuit (A SCVC Taskforce Romantic Suspense Book 1)