Blurb:
A combative relationship.
A red-hot attraction.
And no time to be alone together.
Just when Chloe’s career starts to take off, Bennett wishes it would all slow down long enough to spend a wild night alone with his intern-cum-girlfriend. Preferably on in which he can show her he’s still the boss.
After her continued refusals to take time off with him, Bennett can finally no longer take no for an answer. And so the couple find themselves with two plane tickets, one French villa, and a surprising conversation that, predictably, leaves them wrestling under the covers.
Picking up where Beautiful Bastard left off, Chloe Mills and Bennett Ryan continue their fiery love-hate relationship… and take it to the next level.
Rating: 4/5 stars
Side Notes:
- Genres: Contemporary Romance, Fiction
- Highly recommend for 16 years and above
- Book (novella) 1.5 in the Beautiful Bastard series
- TW: Explicit language, Sexually graphic scenes
- Romance Tropes: Workplace romance, Love-Hate relationship
Book Quotes:
- “Find a woman who will be your equal in every way. Don’t let yourself fall for someone who’ll put your world before theirs. Fall for the powerhouse who lives as fearlessly as you do. Find the woman who makes you want to be a better man.”
- “I can function without you. But I don’t like being away from you. It feels like you take my home with you when you go.”
- “I’d definitely found my equal, the woman who made my life a living hell and lived to antagonize me. A woman whose mouth I wanted to tape shut…every bit as much as I wanted to kiss it.”
- “I never expected to feel this way about someone.” She stared at me, eyes wide nad lips parted as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing. I stood and ran over to the dresser, pulling the box from the drawer and carrying it over to her. When I opened the box and let her see my grandmother’s antique diamond and sapphire ring, she clammed a hand over her mouth. “I want to be married,” I said again. Her silence was unnerving, and fuck, I’d completely botched this with my rambling nonsense. “Married to you, I mean.” Her eyes filled with tears and she held them, unblinking. “You. Are. Such. An. ass.”
- “If she needs a nap, I could just hang out and wait for her to wake up right? I could like down near her, reassure myself that she was really here and we were really doing this and just…what? Touch her hair? Holy shit. Had I always been this creepy?”
- “You were going to propose to me?” I asked, still completely confused. “Do women even do that?” She punched me, hard, in the arm. “Yes, you chauvinist. And you totally stole my thunder.”
- “I missed having her as my intern. I missed bossing her around. I really missed her bossing me around in return.”
- “I’m so glad we met when we did. Even if you were an enormous pain in my ass you’re still the best thing that ever happened to me.”
- “How insane would it have been to know Chloe in my early twenties? We would have torn this place up, and probably lasted only a weekend. Isn’t it amazing how you meet the person you’re meant to meet, when you’re supposed to meet her?”
- “It was comical to compare that to the reaction I’d had to losing Chloe. I’d essentially turned into a filthy hobo, not eating, not showering, and surviving entirely on scotch and self-pity”
- “I set my glass down and met his eyes, feeling an overwhelming surge of affection for this man. “That … makes sense,” I said, searching for the right words. “I don’t think I appreciated what it meant to see you ever day, either. Even if I did want to poison you on no less than twenty-seven separate occasions.” “Ditto,” he replied with a smirk. “And sometimes I feel guilty for how many times I threw you out the window in my fantasies. But I most certainly plan on making it up to you.”
- “Don’t let yourself fall for someone who’ll put your world before theirs. Fall for the powerhouse who lives as fearlessly as you do. Find the woman who makes you want to be a better man.”
- “I want to be married. I want you to marry me.”
- “I know we have only been together for a little over a year,” I explained, quickly. “Maybe it’s too soon? I understand if it’s too soon. It’s just that how you feel about the way we kiss? I feel that way about everything we do together. I love it. I love to be inside you, I love working with you, I love watching you work, I love fighting with you, and I love just sitting on the couch and laughing with you. I’m lost when I’m not with you, Chloe. I can’t think of anything, or anyone, who is more important to me, every second. And so for me, that means we’re already sort of married in my head. I guess I wanted to make it official somehow. Maybe I sound like an idiot?” I looked over at her, feeling my heart try to jackhammer its way up my throat. “I never expected to feel this way about someone.”
- “I’d definitely found my equal, the woman who made my life a living hell and lived to antagonize me. A woman whose mouth I wanted to tape shut . . . every bit as much as I wanted to kiss it. My girlfriend, my former intern, Miss Chloe Mills. Beautiful Bitch.”
- “but at some point, Bennett had become it for me. As in it it. The One. And it was fucking terrifying.”
- “Hasn’t my mother warned you that I’ve never been good at sharing?”
- “But he’s also not your only client! Rule number one in business is to not ever let the big dog know how small the other dogs are.”
- “She’d looked out for me when she knew I was broken and lost without Chloe. In contrast, I’d let Sara continue on with a man I knew was unfaithful, all because I felt it wasn’t my place to interfere. Where would I be if Sara had done the same?”