Playing It Safe

by Barbie Bohrman

Julia Boyd has dated more than her share of jerks, and she’s done even pretending to like them—and her sharp tongue wouldn’t let her fake it anyway. Putting her dating life on hold and focusing on her event planning career is a much safer bet for this salacious blue-eyed blonde…until she meets her newest client.

Organizing the opening for an art gallery should be a breeze for Julia, but gallery owner Alex Holt is becoming very distracting. Tall and muscular with enough charisma and sexy dimples to make Julia swoon (then salivate), Alex could be the perfect man. The two of them click immediately, creating enough witty banter to make her libido go into overdrive.

But just before flames of passion can erupt with Alex, Julia begins planning an engagement party…and learns the groom is Aiden, the man who broke her heart years ago. When Aiden admits that he still has feelings for Julia, everything changes. Should she seek shelter in the familiarity of the past, or should she risk everything on a hot new love?

• ISBN10: 1477825460
• ISBN13: 9781477825464
• Publish Date: 1 October 2014
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Imprint: Montlake Romance
• Format: Paperback (US Trade)
• Pages: 304
• Language: English

Reviews

[Cocktails and Books]

If you've read Barbie Bohrman's PROMISE ME, than you'll recognize the characters who take center stage in this book. And let me start the review by saying this, there is SOOOOOOOOO much more to Julia and Alex.

Julia and Alex have this amazing chemistry and sexual tension, but despite that nothing has happened between these two characters since we saw them in PROMISE ME. A year later, Alex still hires Julia's party planning company to handle all his gallery events and the sexual tension between them is almost a third entity. But we discover there's a very good reason for their relationship being stuck where it is and Alex has a game plan to move it forward. See, Julia was burned by her ex-fiance and has had a tough time letting people in and trusting them. Somehow, without knowing all the dirty details, Alex senses this and won't make a move until he knows she's ready. But when he's determined she is....he holds nothing back.

As I said, the chemistry between these two was amazing. Julia with her wit and sarcasm often had me laughing and wondering what exactly seemingly uptight Alex was going to do with a spitfire like her. But behind his pressed suits and haughty demeanor was a down and dirty alpha male who wanted his woman, was going to make sure she was so satisfied she couldn't think straight and was going to brand her so all other males knew it. Julia didn't know what hit her when Alex gave the hard court press and he managed to break down all her relationship walls, but she still had little seeds of doubt about whether or not what she had with Alex was real. Luckily for Julia, her assistant, Alex's receptionist and her best friend Sabrina, help Julia and Alex (more so Julia) navigate their issues and/or insecurities to figure out what they have is worth grabbing onto with both hands.

While this book has some carry over characters from PROMISE ME, it's a stand alone novel that I absolutely adored. The storyline was one that could have you laughing out loud one minute, fanning yourself the next and reaching for a kleenex when you turn the page. The characters were sheer perfection and had me wishing for a few hundred more pages. If you've never read Barbie Borhman before, I highly recommend this title.