No Matter the Cost (Unsanctioned #2) by Anna Hackett Format: eARC
Source: author
Formats available: paperback, ebook
Genres: contemporary romance, romantic suspense
Series: Unsanctioned #2
Pages: 283
Published by Anna Hackett on January 28, 2026
Purchasing Info: Author's Website, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org
Goodreads
I’ll make her mine, if she doesn’t kill me first.
Bastian
I came from nothing and became known as the Reaper. The most feared CIA assassin in the business. Then I retired, faked my death, and now spend my time running my casino.
But there’s one part of my past I can’t let go—the tiny female assassin who’s vowed to kill me.
We were mentored by the same man, a man we both considered a father, but there’s nothing brotherly about what I feel for
Lark.
Now, we’re enemies and she won’t rest until I’m dead.
I won’t rest until she’s mine.Lark
I have one mission—kill Bastian Thorne.
I lost everything when my parents were murdered. Until a grizzled CIA agent took me in and molded me into a deadly assassin.
Then Bastian executed him.
My plan: infiltrate Bastian’s luxurious life and take him down. But he proves hard to kill and forces me to face an ugly, tangled truth.
Secrets from my past collide with my blood-drenched present. I find myself in the sights of a dangerous killer. One with twisted reasons for wanting me dead.
Now, the only man I can trust is my enemy.
But I know getting close to Bastian is the biggest risk of all.
My Review:
RED was code for “Retired, Extremely Dangerous” at least according to the classic action movie (OMG only from 2010) of the same name. A movie which was based loosely on a comic book mini-series.
Both the comic series and the movie were about a group of retired assassins who were still so DAMN dangerous that their former organizations put a hit out on them. With disastrous, downright deadly, consequences for the would-be hitters. The targets emerged more-or-less unscathed.
I’m reminding you of this because those retired assassins in RED would have a lot in common with the Unsanctioned crew in Las Vegas, as they are also retired, extremely dangerous, assassins who are still willing to work the occasional side job if it’s righteous – and so far they absolutely have been.
Righteous, necessary, and damn good reads. And romances, which, come to think of it, was also true of that first RED movie.
But the story in the Unsanctioned series is even more action-packed than the movie (and that’s saying something!) because the gentlemen who own, operate and live near the Avernus casino in Las Vegas, “retired” a bit earlier than the crew in RED. So, they have had a bit harder time figuring out what to do with themselves after they’ve gotten out of the adrenaline-soaked game of killing for their respective countries and/or organizations – and even more energy to burn while they do it.
Not that everyone doesn’t have at least a bit of trouble dealing with that transition, but for these guys, it’s considerably more than just a bit. They all got out while they still had a bit of their souls left, they got out clean-ish which is as good as that was going to EVER get, and they got out with enough money to set themselves up in style. All they had to do was figure out what to, well, DO with themselves.
In the first book, Burn the World Down, their little found family of (mostly) former killers found their true calling, and one member, Nash Oakley, found that he had an option on a second chance with the one woman he could never forget. A woman who had taken the walk to the ‘dark side’ on her very own, and was more than ready to join him there.
In this second book, Sebastian Thorne is in a bit of the same quandary. The woman he can’t forget is someone he never let himself think about that way. Because his CIA mentor adopted her and trained her to be one of them. Another assassin. But when they were part of the same little killing family, Bastian was nearly a decade older and he couldn’t let himself think of her as anything but a little girl.
Lark’s not a little girl anymore – but she’s definitely still the deadly assassin that their mentor trained so rigorously. And this time, she has Bastian in her sights. Because he killed their mentor – her father-figure. Now her heart is set on revenge.
At least that’s what she told herself when she buried one of her knives in Bastian at the end of the first book. Her reasons for stabbing him in the shoulder instead of in the heart she’s certain he doesn’t have…she doesn’t want to examine those too closely because they might bring her world crashing down around her.
If someone else doesn’t get there first.
Escape Rating A-: First, I have to admit that I got into this one for the story – which is not a bad thing at all. Of course it’s not. However, as has been true for the last several of this author’s books, the original cover did not wow me. (shown at left for comparison as your ogling mileage may definitely vary). However, I have been loving the special edition covers, so that’s the one that I’ve used as the feature for this post and on Instagram.
Romantic suspense series, which Unsanctioned most definitely is, often begin with the premise that someone needs saving – and it’s usually the female main character. Whether or not a story/series with that premise works for this reader depends a whole lot on the why of that formula. Why does she need saving?
It’s not about the reason per se, but rather that the reason often runs counter to my thing for competence porn. (OMG that’s a more, well, potent pun than usual for this series, but moving right along…) What I mean to say is that both the suspense and the romance work a LOT less well for me if the FMC needs saving because she’s either #TSTL (Too Stupid to Live) or because she reacts stupidly to a situation that is obviously a dangerous trap of some kind.
I love a romance of equals, and that’s hard to achieve when one character has been too much of an idiot. (I’m not fond of the male main character being an idiot either, but their idiocy – at least in romantic suspense – tends to go down a different track, usually the “I’m not worthy” fallacy. I digress. Sort of.)
All of that means that I loved Lark as Bastian’s romantic interest/would-be assassin because she’s every bit as competent as he is at the same job on the same dark side. They’re each as worthy – or unworthy – as the other, so whatever emotional rabbit holes they go down, they go down together.
While someone in the shadows wants to put them both down – for good. Or rather, for bad. Let’s just say thoroughly and completely as “good” and “bad” don’t work in this case – at all.
Except in the sense that Lark starts out believing that Sebastian killed their mentor in cold blood. Which, in truth, he did. But his reasons for that hit were righteous – although she’s just not willing to listen. At least not at first. Reaching that point takes them from the opposite sides of a very personal conflict to the same side against a mutual enemy. An enemy targeting them both.
And the enemy of my enemy is at least my friend. Or, in the case of Bastian and Lark, something a whole lot more intimate leading to closure for some of the biggest questions in both of their lives AND a well-earned and well-deserved happy ever after.
For after that happy ever after, there’s a bit of a teaser for the next book in this series, which looks like it won’t be out until summer or later this year at the earliest. Still, I have the author’s next Hunter Squad and Langston Hotels books to look forward to in the first half of this year. Which I certainly am.
