Retired soldier Richard Davis wants a stable life in a quiet town with a forever man. Becoming the sheriff of Hope, Arizona, accomplishes two of his three goals, but instead of finding a serious partner, he falls for too-young-to-be-committed and too-flakey-to-be-serious Todd Smitty. Richard won’t find the right man if he’s obsessed with the wrong one, so he walks away from Todd.
It’s lust at first sight when Todd meets his sister’s army friend. He sets his sights on the worldly, strong, stable older man, and the more time he spends with Richard, the harder he falls. But after three years together, Richard cuts off all contact with no explanation.
When a mutual obligation requires Todd to move into Richard’s house, he’s thrilled at the opportunity to earn a second chance. Ignoring Todd from across town was hard enough. Can Richard resist temptation under his own roof?
Reviewer: Shee Reader
Oh my word, I’ve been waiting for this book since Jesse’s Diner (Hope book 2) came out and we met Richard refusing to answer his phone to the-reader-didn’t-know-who, but now I’m guessing it was Todd Smitty!
Richard is a very strong and complex man. He makes up rules for himself and is pretty inflexible about crossing lines. Then there’s Todd (who we first met in McFarland’s farm - Hope book 1) who is light and carefree, fun loving and enthusiastic. The perfect antidote in fact to Richard’s brooding.
Richard tried to suppress his desire to own Todd completely, which is what Todd truly wants. I adored the fact that these two guys are the perfect yin to each other’s yang, just as I have come to rely on from Cardeno C. The story is well crafted, with less of the incredibly sharp sassy dialogue of some of CC’s books, but with plenty of character development and astute understanding.
Todd knows his own limitations, but when the men are bound together in responsibility, Todd commits time and energy to working out what went wrong between him and Rich, and working out how to fix it. The absorbing thing about these guys (and one of the things I most love about CC’s writing) is that they really talk to, and listen to each other.
I enjoyed seeing characters from the previous books getting a mention, and we get a little teaser for what I hope will be Hope book 4!
It is a quick fix of happy loveliness being a pretty quick read, but is no worse off for that. I absolutely loved it.
Highly recommended.
I received a free copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.
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