Blurb:

Two years ago my wife disappeared. No note, no lead-up. I headed off to work in the morning, leaving her cozy and warm in our bed and came back to nothing. The cops had one suspect, me. When that theory didn’t pan out they moved on to the next best thing for their caseload. She’d run away with her lover. I knew better though. I knew there was no way the woman who’d vowed to spend her life with me, who’d only just told me she couldn’t wait to have our first child, could ever just walk away.

For two years I never stopped looking, hoping. Then just as I told myself I had to move on, she returned with no memory of where she’d been or how she got there. Getting her back was just the beginning, now I was in a race against the clock to find out who, and why before the enemy struck again.

May be spoilers:

The Returned has 36 chapters and an epilogue. It’s about Cade and Zandi.

Zandi has been gone for 2 years. They were very much in love and he’s been looking for her ever since. His mom and Mindy wore him down to where he agreed to marry Mindy. He quit caring about everything. He doesn’t want anyone but Zandi. He’s never kissed Mindy, they were just friends even though she wanted more.

So at the start of this, he has to tell Mindy that he isn’t going to marry her, his heart still belongs to Zandi. Even with him not knowing where she is or why she left, he loves her completely.

So in the beginning, we see all his heartbreak, we feel everything he feels. It’s a little long winded with just being in his thoughts for a lot of it, but I think it was needed.

We see that she was actually kidnapped all this time. But she’s escaped from the taker. We know that Cade was drugged so he’s been in the hospital for a few days.

When Zandi comes back we see that she’s been drugged for all the time she was gone. Her memory hasn’t come all the way back, but to her, it doesn’t feel like they’ve been apart for 2 years.

Cade, wow, I just loved him. Yeah there was a lot of internal talking, but it went with the story and I could definitely feel his love and hurt for her. He was so happy to have her back, but pissed all the same, wondering what happened. When he finds out what she’s been through there is no stopping him from finding the ones responsible.

We do get to see a little of their beginning from his memories. There is no denying the love they have for each other. It was love at first sight for them both, even though she turned him down for a month, which I thought was great.

We see that Zandi has given birth and knows she has twins somewhere. She’s heartbroken. Cade finds it hard to believe her, but he does. They have people trying to figure out what happened and where their babies are.

He tells her there’s been no one else for him, but he neglects to tell her about Mindy.

Hot sex scenes start after 50%, but I didn’t feel I was missing out, cause we needed the story and it took awhile. I loved it though.

Mindy shows up and Zandi is pissed when she finds out Mindy and Cade were engaged and he tried to defend Mindy thinking it’s not her fault, it’s his, but it pisses Zandi off. So there is some hot rough, punishing sex. He figures that’s the only way to get her to listen. She’s hurt and jealous.

Cade feels guilty, cause he agreed and went along with the engagement even though nothing ever happened between them, not even a kiss.

When they find the babies and find out who kidnapped Zandi and took the babies, he feels even more guilty. He definitely gives the villain what they deserve. Not going to say who it is, even though you’ll probably figure it out early on.

I really loved this one even though it was long. I don’t think any of it could have been cut to make a shorter story. Great writing, I loved it. Epilogue is a few months out. They have their baby boy and the twins. Great read. I gave it 4 out of 5 stars.  Thanks for reading. Hope you check it out. You can get the book on Amazon here: The Returned