Thank you so much to Hambright PR for the complimentary copy of the book & ALC!

This book is out now!

I read my first book by Lauren Blakely last month and was obsessed so when the opportunity came to read this one, I jumped on it! This is a 3rd book in a series but was a standalone and I did not feel like I missed anything not reading the other books. Could it have added more to the side characters - probably. I was able to see Fable again after reading her love story in My Favorite Holidate.

Friends to lovers isn't my fave trope but in this I absolutely ADORED it! We learn in the prologue how gone Asher is for his best friend Maeve years prior to the current timeline of the book. "I fell in love with you ten years ago. And I fell in love with you all over again when you said, 'I do.'" And during the current time frame, Maeve spent the most money during a charity auction to go on a date with Asher. That date was a weekend in Vegas where they decide to get married for the trip and they would annul it when they returned home. Welllll that turned into much more than what either of them anticipated!

This is a book where throughout majority of it especially in the second half where I wanted to scream JUST TELL HER/HIM HOW YOU FEEL! But my gosh both Asher and Maeve were just so great together! Their friendship backbone made them being in a relationship make so much sense and made it so easy. Asher is a top tier book husband! He has a great career, he is hot, he is considerate, he is selfish, he always puts others before himself and so much more! Maeve was such a sweet person and a great addition to Asher's life. There was a moment in the later half where she really was the strength he needed.

I want to watch you melt. I want to hear you moan. Want to see you beg, crawl, fall apart."

I knew after reading Holidate that Lauren can write the hell out of a sex scene. And this one was no exception. She had such a way of crafting them falling in love throughout the book - in sexual and non sexual ways. The whole time I was smiling while reading this book. The carefulness that Asher was with Maeve - swoon! He knew they were delicate feelings involved and they both knew how complicated mixing their friendship with sex could be. And neither of them wanted to ruin their friendship. It just all was so beautifully done! One of my favorite things in hockey romances is the acknowledgement of the FMC from the MMC on the rink and of course Asher did this so deliciously!

I paired my reading with the audio. This was done in a duet narration and it was perfection. The narrators were Vanessa Edwin and Robert Hatchet. I was not familiar with Robert's narration previously but BOY OH BOY I absolutely loved his voice! I had listened to Vanessa previously and once again knocked it out of the park! And the banter between the characters made their duet just so so good!

I highly recommend if you love a friends to Vegas wedding to lovers and hockey!