ONE NIGHT : DENIED (One Night Trilogy #2) by JODI ELLEN MALPAS

 “You’re my habit. You belong to me.”

So, it was the much anticipated ‘Miller Time’ again and to say we were excited is an understatement! We fell head over heels for Miller in Promised so were giddy to satisfy our curiosity and crush on this possessive beautiful and vulnerable man. Well he did not disappoint; he was as intriguing and addictive as in book one, which we loved. We switched between swooning over him and wanting to give him his ‘thing’. Miller still has so many secrets; a few were exposed and we have to admit to having tears at times as we found out about his childhood and the why’s of some of his fears and quirks.

“I love your bones Miller Hart.”

Olivia went through a change in Denied; from sweet and vulnerable to feisty and aggressive. At times she came over a tad too dramatic and we questioned her friendship with Gregory which in book one was one of the highlights for us. Gregory was her clutch, he calmed her, was her safe place bringing humour and a much needed counterbalance to the intensity and ferocity of Miller and Livy’s relationship. In Denied Gregory went through almost a complete personality change and his sexuality somewhat contradicted that of book one. Their friendship went through a change we found unnecessary and unbelievable. We ended up having a lot of questions at the end. Sadly for us this became an issue we just didn’t feel right with and is one of the reasons we didn’t enjoy Denied as much as we wanted to.

“We’re more broken if we don’t don’t have each other. Let me put us back together again.  I need you, Olivia. Desperately. You’re making my world light. “

We also found that the middle part of Denied felt quite repetitive with the back and forth which made it into that dreaded territory of the filler book in a trilogy. This; added to an odd choppy chapter change meant our hearts sank as we began to loose our excited momentum. We started to get really worried and heartbroken that we just weren’t enjoying this second instalment as much as we desperately wanted to.  After all we loved Promised which was a complete winner for us. Then, Jodi Ellen Malpas did what she does best; she pulled us right back in the latter part of Denied when we finally unravelled a little more of the mystery that is Miller Hart and we felt we were moving forward again. These moments where Miller bared his soul were quite simply breath taking and so incredibly beautiful we had tears. Also; toward the end of the book Livy finally showed us once more what we loved about her in Promise. She showed strength; resilience; compassion and honest love. Livy is a beautiful and funny girl and she finally shone for us again. The cliff-hanger was brilliant and genius; we are definitely excited to read the final instalment now; can’t wait. We are desperate for more revelations in Unveiled.

“What’s the most resilient part of you?” 
“My heart, Livy. My heart is the most resilient part of me.”

Denied had passion; mystery and some absolutely explosive moments. Most importantly of all is that it had some stunning moments of beauty and perfection that touched our hearts. Whilst it’s sadly not our favourite book by this Author it did have moments that showcased her brilliant and evocative writing and her ability to inject humour in the darkest of moments.

“We just painted perfect, sweet girl.”