This book founds its way onto my TBR pile when I started making my lists of books to read for the Digital First Read-a-Thon. I’d never heard of this author before preparing for the DFRAT but I’m so glad that she came onto my radar because I enjoyed Liam and Talia’s story.
This story follows Liam Brodie as he sets out to get the girl he’s been wanting for quite some time. Talia Bennett has been a friend to his sister’s for about two years and he wants to get closer than she’s letting him. Talia’s family life isn’t the great big ball of happiness that Liam shares with his family and she really doesn’t want to dump all of her family drama on them so she doesn’t talk about her family life. She’s got a depressed Mom that can be quite the handful and she’s a huge reason why Talia isn’t big on family, even though she loves the Brodie family. Being in the marine corps gives her an excuse to be deployed during the holidays but this Thanksgiving, things change.
What I enjoyed about this story was even though it’s such a short story, there’s a surprising amount of depth to the story, to the characters and I really dug that about this one. Talia’s character is reserved and she keeps people at a distance because it’s what she’s always done. I really liked Talia’s character and I liked what Croix did with her character. There have been stories that I’ve read where heroines just like Talia got on my hot damn nerves and I wanted to smack the crap out of them but that wasn’t the case with Talia at all. With Talia, I wanted to be her best friend and include her in my own family.
Liam is a total dreamboat. He’s a total alpha manly man who knows what he wants and isn’t going to give up on her until he gets what he wants. I could totally tell why Talia was in love with him and when she thought she didn’t deserve him, I wanted to weep for her. And because of that, I loved Liam all the more because he didn’t give up on her. He just kept right on going until she surrendered to him and when she did, I cheered. I think Liam and his family were just what Talia needed and seeing them get their happy ending was good.
I recommend this book to fans of contemporary romances with military characters. This was a good one. I’m glad that I read it and I will definitely be on the look out for more by this author.
Talia Barnett finds herself flying home to Colorado over Thanksgiving with no idea what awaits her. She and her mother, her only remaining blood relative, have a tenuous relationship due to her mother's mental illness. But when she exits security at the airport, she find her best friend, Angie, and her older brother, Liam waiting for her.
Talia has always envied Angie and Liam for their close knit family, wishing she could have a sliver of what they have together. It's that wish that caused Talia to inform Liam, in the past, that despite their attraction, nothing would happen between them. Talia really does want Liam and she's denying herself a chance with the man because of her embarrassment over her mother's mental illness. But something happens to Talia once Liam starts pushing her. She finds herself giving into him.
Liam has had a thing for Talia for as long as he's known her. While he's let her push him away, he's decided that this Thanksgiving it's going to be the time he makes his move. He soon comes face to face with the ugliness Talia has been dealing with on her own and vows to be there to support her and prove that she can rely on him.
As the book blurb says Liam sees Talia's submissive side and shows her small portion of what he would like to do with her. While their sexual chemistry was hot, Liam (in my opinion) was more a tender lover who likes to be a little pushy than a Dom. And Talia didn't come off as being a submissive, instead she let Liam take the lead.
I enjoyed the storyline and the characters. It was refreshing to actually have the heroine needing to suck it up and crawl back to the hero after screwing things up colossally. If you want a read where a "broken" lead manages to turn their life around and get a HEA, give this one a try.