Review: 4 out of 5 stars - Red Hot Books
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 12 17, 2013
This is a novella that I sincerely wish was a full length novel. Once I started reading, I was hooked. Beth Rogers’s teenage son is going to be the photographer at a wedding. Beth’s going along as his assistant but I think she really did it to keep an eye on him – make sure he’s doesn’t start acting the teenager during the paid gig. Gabriel North is a groomsman in the same wedding. Both of these characters have lost their spouses through death and both of them have some past guilt to overcome.While they’re at the wedding, one of Gabriel’s patients (he’s a pulmonologist who gave up his private practice to work in the ER) is also a guest at the wedding and has an episode that requires some medical intervention. You can’t have better guests for a situation like that than medical professionals – Gabriel a doctor and Beth an RN. There’s some subtle eye flirting between these two until Gabriel decides that if he doesn’t try to get out of his shell, he never will. So off he goes – hoping and praying that Beth says yes.Beth says yes. They decide on one night only – no frills, no fuss – just one night of sex. This is a fine plan until conversation gets in the way; Beth and Gabriel realize that they not only have more in common that they could ever hope for but they bring out the best in each other. Things they long thought dead and unreplaceable. There are moments where I just cringed for Beth and the abuse that she went through in her marriage. But I never once thought of her husband as a ‘bad’ guy. He went off to war very young and came back, basically broken in mind and spirit. The book didn’t go into it but I think his actions were so much more than what was touched on. In the end, I couldn’t help but feel bad for Beth and Jamie as a couple and then happiness for Beth and Gabriel finding each other and the potential of a new life and love.One of the fun and sexy things about Gabriel is that he has a potty mouth – I adored his ‘frank’ descriptions when he’s talking with Beth. She’s a little bit proper, not prudish but she just doesn’t use the kind of words that can’t seem to help but fall out of Gabriel’s mouth. *big grin* He brought out the woman that she though had long been gone.There’re a couple of good secondary characters – Beth’s best friend Connie who was a doll and provided excellent comic relief. I wouldn’t mind seeing her in another story. And then there’s Beth’s son, Drew, whose personality was a testament to the way his mother raised him. I would have liked to see more of their relationship. I get the feeling that Beth as a single parent with her marital history would be something to see. Plus, how does a teenager end up as a professional wedding photographer?Did I mention that Gabriel’s got a mouth on him? Just in case I didn’t, he does and that my dear readers made some fun sex scenes.Happy Reading Folks!Rating: B**ARC provided by Entangled Publishing for reviewReview posted on www.redhotbooks dot com